On Saturday, Hungarian Bence Halász stepped in the men´s hammer throw competition as a silver medallist from the previous edition. In the fourth series, he threw a leading mark of 80.49m which was, for that moment, also a leading result. In the next round however, a polish oponent overtook him. Nevertheless, Bence defended his medal from Munich and left Rome with a new season best. Defenitely a a good step towards Paris.
In the women´s hammer clash, we had a legendary Anita Wlodarczyk in the lineup. The world record holder and a 4-time European champion who missed the last edition due to an injury was ready to fight. Anita opened up strongly and was ranked first after first serie. After Fantini of Italy beat her mark, Anita added some centimeters in her next attempts and marked a throws of 72.92m and 72.24m. An effort brought her a silver, which is also her 6th European Championships medal overall.
Serbian javelin supertalent Adriana Vilagos repeated her second place from European Throwing Cup earlier this year and claimed her second European championships medal. In the third series, however, she marked a unique achievement. With the throw of 64.42m she not only marked the European U23 lead but also broke the 64m barrier for the first time. The throw is ranked 11th in the European all-time lists.
Our representative in the men´s javelin, Jakub Vadlejch of Czechia, also considered as the biggest medal hope for his country brought us a great show on the last day of the Championships. Even though he started with a 81.26m throw, he started moving upwards in the rankings as the competition advanced. In the third series, he moved to the second position with a 84.66m throw, still being 1.28m off the Weber´s leading mark. In his last attempt, Vadlejch used all of his desire and shocked the crowd with a striking 88.65m. His 9th best throw of the carrier secured him the first major title and completed his medal collection from the global/continental championships.
To wind up the Rome journey, Manolo Karalis of Greece was ready to challenge the world-record holder in the men´s pole vault. After completing the first 3 heights on the first attempt, he had to repeat at 5.82m once. Nextly he cleared 5.87 smoothly, which meant also an improvement of his personal best. At that point, there were only him and Duplantis left in the competition. As the Swedish moved higher, Manolo was forced to try at 6.02m. Without success this time, but earning his first outdoor major medal, Greek could not be happier. A great milestone on his journey to improve his 4th place from the Tokyo Olympics.
Many congratulation to all.
Photo: Pawel Skraba
