TEAM ENGLAND notched up some creditable performances at the European Team Athletics Championships held over the weekend in Bydgoszcz, Poland.
Richard Kilty came to Poland with two Commonwealth Games medals to his credit. Once at the Championships, he won the men’s 200m with a time of 20.66 seconds – a victory to add to the gold he had won in the 4x100m the night before. Kilty told Team England that the relay had left him very tired and he was especially pleased to win given that the weather was terrible, with strong winds making running difficult.
The women’s 4x400m relay team – Jodie Williams, Zoey Clarke, Jess Turner and Emily Diamond – picked up second place, with Diamond running a season’s best time. She told Team England that the race, which took place three months after the World Relays competition, had been great fun.
•The relay race is one of the easiest to be disqualified from, given the need for four runners not to over-step their marks and the practice of passing on the baton. Bizarrely Team GB were disqualified from the 4x400m relay in Poland after naming Youcef Zatat as one of the members of the team, rather than Rabah Yousif. Yousif is a regular sprinter – whereas Zatat is a reserve shot putter and wasn’t even in Poland. UK Athletics Performance Director Neil Black said there had been a technical error.
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