Katarina Johnson-Thompson wins European Indoor pentathlon
- Published
European Indoor Championships |
Venue: Prague 02 Arena Dates: Fri 6 - Sun 8 March |
Coverage: Saturday - BBC Two 08:30-11:00 and 16:30-19:30. Sunday - BBC Two 13:05-17:35. Coverage also online, BBC Radio 5 live and 5 live extra |
Katarina Johnson-Thompson won the European Indoor pentathlon title with a British record of 5,000 points.
The 22-year-old ran a personal best of 8.18 seconds in the 60m hurdles and cleared 1.95m in the high jump to lead on 2,259 points after two events.
A 12.35m throw in the shot put dropped her to second but a 6.89m leap won the long jump and an 800m of two minutes, 12.78 seconds set a new British best.
Lucy Hatton won 60m hurdles silver and fellow Briton Serita Solomon was third.
Both ran personal bests - Hatton 7.90 seconds and Solomon 7.93 - as they finished behind Alina Talay of Belarus, who won in 7.85.
Johnson-Thompson broke Jessica Ennis-Hill's record of 4,965 and became just the second athlete to score 5,000 points in the pentathlon.
Ennis-Hill said on Twitter: "Well done Kat! Amazing performance! Sad to see my record go but couldn't have gone to a more deserving athlete!"
However, Johnson-Thompson finished 13 points behind Ukrainian Nataliya Dobrynska's three-year-old world record, having required a run of 2:11.86 in the 800m to break it.
"This is a huge breakthrough," she told BBC Sport. "But I am full of regret from the 800m.
"I thought I could easily run that time and maybe took it for granted. It could've been a different story. I should've been able to do that."
Johnson-Thompson's long jump leap would have won six of the previous seven individual titles at the European Championships while her high jump effort broke Carolina Kluft's championship record.
She had dropped to second behind Belgium's Nafissatou Thiam - who went on to claim silver - after finishing last in the shot put, her weakest event.
A best throw of 12.32m was more than 1.5m behind fellow Briton Morgan Lake, who was second last in that discipline.
Lake, 17, who had moved up to third overall by clearing 1.92m in the high jump - following a personal best of 8.81 seconds in the 60m hurdles - dropped back to sixth after the shot put.
She retained that place after a leap of 6.10m in the long jump, which also kept her on course to break the junior world record.
Lake finished outside of the 2:22.82 she needed in the 800m and ended in ninth place, however she had the consolation of breaking Johnson-Thompson's British junior record.
"I'm happy overall," Lake told BBC Sport. "I'm not ecstatic but it was a solid day.
"The 800m was annoying, I ran it badly."
Meanwhile, Lawrence Clarke finished fifth in the 60m hurdles final behind a French one-two-three led by Pascal Martinot-Lagarde.
Jenny Meadows reached Saturday's 800m semi-final by winning her heat in two minutes, 02.59 seconds.
The 33-year-old was awarded the 2011 title 18 months following the event after a Russian drug cheat was disqualified.
In the women's 400m, 20-year-old Seren Bundy-Davies, who leads the European rankings, came through a photo-finish to reach Saturday's final.
However, Kirsten McAslan and Laura Maddox missed out.
Lee Emanuel and Philip Hurst both qualified for Saturday's 3,000m final.
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