Sarah Reinertsen's plan was to walk across the finish line. She figured she deserved a chance to soak up every moment after just missing a chance to complete one of the world's most difficult races a year earlier.

But she couldn't go through with it once she got there.

Sure, Reinertsen finished the Ironman Triathlon World Championship, becoming the first woman above-the-knee amputee to complete the grueling, 140.6-mile race, but the roaring crowd and chants of "Sarah! Sarah!" turned what was going to be a stroll into a sprint.

"It was one of the most amazing moments of my life," Reinertsen said of finishing the Oct. 15 race in Hawaii. "The crowd was louder than I ever thought. I had plans for the finish, but there was so much energy that I ran right through."

It's no surprise. Reinertsen has been running through barriers all her life.

Born with a tissue defect in her left leg, Reinertsen didn't let the amputation of the limb at age 7 slow her down. The thought of running first entered her mind at age 11, when she went with her father to a local race and saw a woman running with a prosthetic leg.

Mesmerized by what she saw, Reinertsen approached Paddy Rossbach and the two became quick friends. Rossbach helped Reinertsen find a better prosthetic leg and she started working with a physical therapist to learn how to run with it.

Now Reinertsen has completed eight marathons, including the 26-mile run at the Ironman. She holds numerous world records and has been featured on the cover of "Runner's World" magazine.

"I was like, 'Oh my gosh! You can actually run with a prosthetic leg!'" Reinertsen said. "Meeting her changed my life."

But the steps along the way haven't always been easy.

Reinertsen had to wear clunky braces on her legs when she was young and was ridiculed by kids in her Long Island neighborhood because of a prosthetic leg made of wood and rubber. She had to learn to run all over again and struggled with not being able to keep up with the other kids.

Once she got over those hurdles, there were plenty more on the race courses.

At the 1992 Paralympic Games in Barcelona, Spain, Reinertsen was the favorite to win the 100 meters, only to trip out of the starting blocks in the semifinals and miss the finals.

Perhaps the most crushing setback came at last year's Ironman.

Reinertsen became the first woman amputee to compete in the race, which includes a 2.4-mile swim, a 112-mile bicycle ride and finishes with a 26.2-mile run. Certainly, it was an accomplishment, but Reinertsen wanted to finish the race -- not just to prove something to herself, but to inspire amputees everywhere.

She never got that chance. Reinertsen started getting blurry vision about midway through the bike portion, vomited on the course and missed the cutoff by 15 minutes. Instead of running off to glory, Reinertsen was stopped at the transition, crying uncontrollably after learning she wouldn't be able to continue.

"I've had a couple of disappointments in sports and that was by far the most devastating," said Reinertsen, from Portola Hills, Calif. "I was in a funk lying around the house in my pajamas way too much for a while after that."

But like she has throughout her life, Reinertsen used setback as a springboard to success.

Her training more focused than ever before, Reinertsen spent the next year doing everything she could to make sure there wouldn't be another disappointment. The 30-year-old bought a condo at the top of a hill to maximize her workouts and spent 18 hours a week training leading into the event, with the thought of not finishing last year's race pushing her along.

It worked.

Reinertsen made it through the swim with no problem, just as she did last year, then got the bike cutoff in plenty of time, reaching the transition as fans started chanting her name. Energized by the crowd and from crossing the barrier that stopped her the last time, Reinertsen charged through the run and finished the race in just over 15 hours, crossing the line as fans and fellow competitors screamed her name.

"She's my role model now," said Rossbach, president of the Amputee Coalition of America. "This is an absolutely incredible accomplishment and I think that it just shows that if you set your mind to something and it's something that really want to do and you're prepared to put the work into it, you can do almost anything that you want to do. I think she just proved that."

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Catch Reinertsen's inspiring run to the finish on Nov. 12, when a replay of the Ironman Triathlon will be shown on NBC, starting at 4:30 p.m. EST.

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John Marshall is asap's sports writer.

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