Left: Inga Abitova (right) and Lidiya Grigoryeva from Russia carry the Russian flag after Abitova won the women's 10,000 m final at the European Athletics Championships in Gothenburg yesterday. Abitova's winning time was 30 minutes 31.87 seconds. Right: Sweden's Carolina Kluft clears the bar in the high jump event during the women's heptathlon at the European Athletics Championships in Gothenburg yesterday. Kluft won with a leap of 1.89m. - Reuters pictures
GOTHENBURG, (Reuters)
The most hotly anticipated showdown of the European championships ended in anti-climax yesterday when Eunice Barber pulled out of the women's heptathlon competition after two rounds.
Barber, who had been leading the competition by 36 points from world and Olympic champion Carolina Kluft, withdrew due to a thigh problem, practically ensuring the Swede would retain her European title.
"I felt it first yesterday," Barber said. "The physios tried everything."
However, the championships still have the prospect of a re-match in the 100 metres between the two fastest athletes from four years ago — Britain's Dwain Chambers, who was later stripped of the title for doping, and Portugal's Francis Obikwelu.
Obikwelu looked the more comfortable of the two medal favourites, easing up in his second round heat to win in 10.28.
"I ran for 80 metres and then I slowed it down, because I did not want to waste a lot of energy," said the European record holder, who is attempting a 100-200 double.
Chambers, who made his competitive comeback from a two-year ban in June, was troubled by a thigh injury in the run-up to the championships and after clocking 10.24 in the first round had a poor start in his next race to scrape through in fourth.
COLOURFUL CROWD
Kluft gave an enthusiastic crowd, many of whom were clad in the yellow and royal blue colours of their national flag, something to cheer about, although the Swede was disappointed arch rival Barber was no longer in the medal hunt.
"It is sad for the competition, the crowd and it is sad for her, but it does not affect me as a competitor. I always try to focus on my own competition," Kluft told reporters.
The 23-year-old, who is suffering from a hamstring problem got off to a slow start with only the fifth fastest time in the opening event, the 100 hurdles.
"The hamstring was really bad this morning during the warm up. If it hadn't been for the crowd I might have performed even worse," said Kluft.
The Swede's every move was cheered by the crowd and the amount of noise they made as she raced down the home straight in the 200 metres, the final event of first day of heptathlon competition, belied the fact the Ullevi stadium had not been more than two-thirds full during the two sessions.
Kluft finished the day on 3,990 points, 124 ahead of Britain's Kelly Sotherton.
FIRST GOLD
Germany's Ralf Bartels had the honour of becoming the first European champion of 2006, taking victory in the shot put with his final effort of 21.13 metres.
Former world champion Andrei Mikhnevich of Belarus had led for much of the competition, but had to settle for silver by two centimetres. Denmark's Joachim Olsen was third.
The day's other gold medal went to Russia's Inga Abitova, who smashed her personal best by more than a minute to win the women's 10,000 metres in 30 minutes and 31.87 seconds.
Norway's Susanne Wigene prevented a Russian sweep in second ahead of Lidiya Grigoryeva and Galina Bogo-molova.
Having done most of the work Kenyan-born Lornah Kiplagat, now of the Netherlands, was overtaken on the final lap by Abitova and finished fifth.
Turkey's pre-race favourite Elvan Abeylegesse, who has the fastest time in the world this year, did not finish the race.
Three-times Olympic and world champion Jan Zelezny has the chance to claim the one gold medal missing from his cabinet after qualifying for Wednesday's javelin final, although the 40-year-old Czech will be happy with any medal.
"I feel like I am in pretty good shape for my age, but nothing is perfect anymore so any medal I can win would be a success," said Zelezny, who plans to retire after the championships.
Russian world record holder Tatyana Lysenko provided a championship best on the opening morning of competition when she threw 73.23 metres to top qualifying in the hammer competition.
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