I can still remember that glorious day in Helsinki Finland, when Grete Waitz won the first ever athletics world championship gold medal. A year later in the 1984 Los Angeles Olympics she had to settle for silver, and even today the pictures from that race remind me of the heartfelt despair I experienced as it dawned on me that she would not win the gold. Although she was a woman, and I a young boy, she was one of my childhood idols.  She and Ingrid Kristiansen proved that is was possible for someone from a small country like Norway to achieve greatness in sports other than skiing and ice skating, which were our national sports. Grete Waitz won nine (9!) New York City Marathons between 1978 and 1988, more than any other runner in history, and personally I consider her the greatest female long distance runner of all time.

In November 2007 she established the AKTIV Against Cancer foundation together with Helle Aanesen.