The German record holder Konstanze Klosterhalfen surprisingly won the title over 5000 meters at the European Athletics Championships in Munich. The run of the 25-year-old, who was third in the 2019 World Championship, ended in 14:34.20 minutes on Thursday. “It’s the best moment of my life,” said Klosterhalfen. Over 10,000 meters three days earlier, the Leverkusen native had missed out on a medal in fourth place.
It was the first double start of her career in a major title fight. Sara Benfares from Rehlingen came in twelfth place. The Berliner Alina Reh had to give up. Turkey’s European 10,000m champion Yasemin Can finished second in 14:56.91 ahead of Britain’s Eilish McColgan (14:59.34).
Klosterhalfen had missed the final over 5000 meters at the World Cup in Eugene in her adopted home, weakened by the consequences of a corona infection. The exceptional runner had already “imagined this performance differently”. Finally, after the World Championships at the Diamond League meeting in Chorzow/Poland, she showed good running performance again and was seventh over 3000 meters. “Purely in terms of feeling, it was a clear difference to Eugene, because I felt that I was competitive again,” she said and was happy to have “returned to his own racing feeling”.
Klosterhalfen has been training in Portland, Oregon, USA for three years and is the German record holder for a mile, 3,000, 5,000 and 10,000 meters.
Hartmann in the final over 200 meters
Joshua Hartmann was the first German since 1986 to qualify for a European Championship final over 200 meters at the European Championships. In his semi-final, the man from Cologne took second place and also set a personal best of 20.33 seconds. Only three runners were faster. “I have to see that I can get to bed quickly,” said Hartmann exhausted on ARD, it was “not easy to run” on the rain-soaked track in the Olympic Stadium, but in the final “everything was possible.”
In the women’s race, Alexandra Burghardt (Burghausen) reached the final on Friday (10:22 p.m.) as one of the two fastest with a time of 23.05. Hartmann finished second behind Zharnel Hughes (Great Britain), the European runner-up over 100 m ran the best time of the three semi-finals with 20.19. Owan Ansah (Hamburg) finished fourth in his run (20.48) and missed the final. Robin Erewa (Wattenscheid/21.12) had already been eliminated in the preliminary heat. Most recently, 36 years ago, German sprinters were in a European Championship final over half a stadium lap. Back then, Jürgen Evers won silver for the Federal Republic in Stuttgart, Thomas Schröder, Olaf Prenzler and Frank Emmelmann were there for the GDR.
Jessica-Bianca Wessolly (Mannheim), on the other hand, was eliminated from the women’s race, as was Corinna Schwab (Chemnitz), who was traded as a medal contender, and who disappointed in fifth place in her semifinals with a weak 23.44. “I don’t know why, everything went well in training,” she said.