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Germany are first SPAR European Team Champions after spectacular Day Two in Leiria

Most pundits found little to choose between Germany and Russia before the start of the SPAR European Team Championships, and the final result proved that they were right, with Germany prevailing in the Portuguese city of Leiria by the narrow margin of 326.5 points to Russia’s 320.

The innovative new rules changes introduced by European Athletics to make the event unpredictable and exciting proved to be a success as the destination of the championships was still in question even up to the last of the 40 events contested over the weekend.

“The decisive factor was the attitude of the team as a whole and right from the start,” said Germany’s head coach for track events Rüdiger Harksen.

“This shows that we are on the right track for the World Championships (which will be held in Berlin in August).  The first day was a roller-coaster ride with some highs and lows but today we weren’t robbed of anything. I’m not going to single out any individual from the team because this was an all-round team effort. Individualists have become a team,” added Harksen, echoing the ethos of the championships as envisaged by European Athletics.

Nevertheless, some individuals inevitably demand that the spotlight be shone on them.

There were three world-leading performances over the weekend. Two came on the first day; The Ukraine’s Yuliya Kresun ran 800m in 1:58.62 while Germany’s Christina Obergföll sent the Javelin out to 68.59m.

On Sunday, French pole vaulter Renaud Lavillenie made himself a candidate for the unofficial title of “Man Of The Weekend” after he cleared 6.01m for a new national record and the best outdoor mark in the world this year.

The 22-year-old from Cognac went over 5.90m on his first jump and then produced a magnificent clearance with his second attempt at 6.01m, going at least five centimetres clear, before failing once at a ‘Bubka-esque’ height of 6.10m.

Including Lavillenie, four national records were set and six events produced European-leading marks for 2009.

There was also Ariane Friedrich. The bottle-blonde High Jump heroine of the German team cleared 2.02m at the first time of asking to get maximum points in her specialist event in the middle of Sunday afternoon.

Her 12 points turned the tide for Germany as they took the lead for the first time in the championships, with eight events still to go, but it spurred on her compatriots to ensure that, metaphorically and then literally in the last two events of the championships, the baton was not dropped.

“I gave everything. I would have done whatever was required to get 12 points,” said Friedrich, emphasising the German team spirit.

However, although Germany were the SPAR European Team Championships winner, with five individual victories, European Athletics was also a winner.

The new rules and regulations were generally considered to be a success and although there will be further refinements the consensus was that the goal of bringing athletics to a wider audience - with the event being seen in 59 different countries on television, including several outside of Europe - was definitely achieved.

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