By Steve Cram BBC Sport commentator

In his latest column Steve Cram looks ahead to Jo Pavey's greatest test yet, calls for anti-doping change and explains why his season is still going strong.

The Great North Run will be a landmark day for Jo Pavey as she makes her road racing debut in the half-marathon.

It will either propel her into the world of endurance events on the road or, if it does not go well, she will probably turn back towards the track.

Pavey could turn her back on the track if it goes well on the road

Paula Radcliffe, who raced with Jo as a junior, made the decision some years back to switch her focus to the road and went straight into the marathon.

For Jo, this is not about emulating Paula and she will not go as far as the marathon yet. However, this is an important new challenge for her.

Jo is happy with what she has achieved and she has been very, very close to the best in the world.

But the problem is she cannot find a way through to win because of the strength of the Kenyans and Ethiopians - she saw the writing on the wall as far as that was concerned a couple of years ago.

Jo wants to feel competitive and to have a chance of winning something. She has always had problems with injury and so struggles to get the mileage in her legs. If she can cope with that, then she has every opportunity and I think she will run well.

I still believe she should mix track and road running. We will find out what choices she will have to make on Sunday.

The organisers of the Great North Run were keen on building up the women's race and the men's event is struggling now that Paul Tergat has pulled out.

Olympic and European marathon champion Stefano Baldini and world marathon champion Jaouad Gharib are still in the field, so it will be interesting to see what happens.

Christine Ohuruogu's one-year ban for missing three out-of-competition drugs tests was, in my opinion, unnecessarily harsh.

The UK authorities need to make sure they are catching people who are cheating by using drugs and not just those who are being careless.

The whole affair brings to mind my strong belief that we should have an independent doping body which conducts tests and hands out the punishments.

At the moment, UK Sport funds the elite athlete programmes and deals with anti-doping too - I am slightly uneasy about that.

There is no suggestion of inappropriate behaviour but it could send out the wrong messages.

I believe we should follow the example of Usada and Wada and establish an independent entity.

Maybe this is the right time to look at how our anti-doping system works and to try and put clear water between what they do and the role of UK Sport in supporting and funding athletes.

The dawn of the Great North Run tends to put a bit of a full-stop on the summer season and signals the cross country and indoor action to come over the winter.

Gatlin's positive drugs test took the shine off Powell's good season

But looking back, I think the big stories off the track have overshadowed what has been quite a good year in terms of performance.

There were some good contributions at the Commonwealth Games, then we got excited by Asafa Powell and Justin Gatlin's rivalry and several new faces emerged such as Sanya Richards (400m), Xavier Carter (200m) and Becky Lyne (800m).

But all of that has been obscured by other events - Gatlin's failed drugs test, Marion Jones' positive drugs test and then its retraction, Ohuruogu's ban, the return of Dwain Chambers and controversy surrounding Linford Christie.

Athletics actually had a better year than the overall impression would suggest!

As for me, well I've decided to do the New York marathon in November. My entry is in and the flights are booked - but wouldn't you know it, as soon as I did that I got injured.