by Stuart Weir
European Running Championships marathons
Day two of the first ever European Running Championships, held in Belgium, included the two marathons.
Italy’s Iliass Aouani was the surprise winner of the men’s marathon in a thrilling finish.
Aouani found himself outnumbered by the Israel trio Maru Teferi, Haimro Alame and Gashau Ayale in the final stages of a hard fought race. As the race entered the final kilometers it was clear the medals were going to be decided between the quartet who were comfortably ahead of the rest of the field, with Aouani sprinting home to take gold in 2:09.05. Not surprisingly Israel won the team prize.
The final result was:
1 Iliass Aouani (Italy) 2:09.05
2 Gashau Ayale (Israel) 2:09.08
3 Maru Teferi, (Israel) 2:09.17
4 Haimro Alame (Israel) 2:09.27
For gold medallist Aouani, it was an improvement of 18 places on his result at the Munich 2022 European Championships, which was only his second race at the distance. He commented: “I was not very confident because my opponents were very good but in this kind of race, PRs are not so important. It was tough, but these races are not won by the strongest, but by the wisest.
“Behind that scream at the finish line were many years of hard times. Last year I didn’t make it to the Olympics. It was a really frustrating year. I saw a lot of doors close, faced a lot of disappointments, there were a lot of doubts, dark times and moments of depression. But I’m really happy with the way everything turned out today”.
The women’s marathon saw Spain take the team prize with a 1-2 in the individual race. The medallists were
1 Fatima Ouhaddou Nafie (Spain) 2:27,14
2 Majida Maayouf (Spain) 2:27.41
3 LonahSalpeter (Israel) 2:27.41
Dourado Nafie’s race looked in some jeopardy when she found herself sprawled on the asphalt after colliding with a male club runner at a drinks station in the mid-stages of the race. Luckily no serious harm was done as the 31-year-old picked herself up and pulled clear for a surprise but richly deserved title in 2:27:14.
Never before had a Spanish woman been crowned European marathon champion since the event was introduced to the European Athletics Championships programme in 1982 but Ouhaddou Nafie ran her way into the annals of Spanish athletics with victory in Leuven and she also led Spain to the team title.
The winner said of her victory: “I’m very happy to win the title. I had a hard preparation because of Ramadan. We also prepare at night; it wasn’t easy for us to prepare during Ramadan. When I started, I was thinking about a medal but I didn’t know which color of medal it would be”.
