Day 6 - The European Championships 2002 - Munich Germany

Day 6's events consisted of the Men's Marathon, 800m and 5000m Final, as well as the Women's 1500m finals.

Marathon Men Winner Janne Holmen Finland Time 2:12.14
Janne Holmen of Finland recorded one of the major shocks of the Championships, when he ran away from the rest of the field to win in 2:12.14, a minute clear of his rivals.

In conditions effected by heavy rain Holmen took the lead early and maintained a consistent pace from start to finish. Passing through 10K in 31:43, Holmen was soon to be joined by the 'unfancied' Norwegian runner, Karl Rasmussen. These two 'unlikely' leaders headed a field who chose not to follow a somewhat 'damp' pace. With Paris Marathon winner, Benoit Zwierzchlewski of France, and Julio Rey of Spain content to run in the group 39 seconds off the pace as early as 10Km.

What was to happen was a 'gross' underestimation of Holmen's ability; considering the man had run 28:30 for 10 000m over the last 2 years, as well as a sub63 half-marathon. With Rasmussen and the Finn content to run together, they passed through 15K in 47:26 [no staggering pace] and quite remarkably they had increased the lead to 58 seconds. Yet, when they passed through the halfway mark in 66:44 and the rest of the field had not made a move to close the gap [the gap was still 57/58 seconds] one began to wonder whether the 'folly' of the main group would be realised.

At 30K in 1:34.20, the stupidity of the chasing group [or non-chasing group] was proving to be ridiculous, as the distance to the front had increased to 1min 29. The 'contempt' of the more fancied runners was rewarded with shock. Shock when they [the group] attempted to apply pressure from 30K to 35K, only for Holmen to match them by running 15:23 for those 5Km's. A move which was to rid the Finn of the intentions of the Norwegian.

35K came in 1:49.44 and the gap to the chasing group was still 1:28, the pursuers had however closed on Rasmussen. With 7K of the race to run, the chasing athletes would have to produce something remarkable to catch Holmen, however when the Finn covered the next 5K in 15:34 to pass through 40K in 2:05.18, he had all but 'sewn up' the race.

From the chasing group emerged Pavel Loskutov of Estonia, Spain's Julio Rey and Daniele Caimmi of Italy, who 'ghosted' past the 'luckless' Rasmussen [who had the only joy of recording a PB of 2:14:00 for 8th] within the last 2K. This trio were now left to fight out for the remaining 2 medals realising that the gold was no longer within their grasp.

Rey was the first to attack with 1K to go and he soon disposed of the Italian, however Loskutov was content to wait until the final 300m before pulling away with relative ease to take the silver in 2:13.18 with Rey finishing in 2:13.21 for bronze.

Holmen went on to record a fine victory in the most memorable manner for the 'hardworking' Finn, however best forgotten by the rest of the more 'fancied' runners.

Results : Women's Marathon
1 Janne Holmen (Fin) 2:12:14
2 Pavel Loskutov (Est) 2:13:18
3 Julio Rey (Spa) 2:13:21
4 Daniele Caimmi (Ita) 2:13:30
5 Alberto Juzdado (Spa)2:13:35
6 Alejandro Gomez (Spa) 2:13:40
7 Kamal Ziani (Spa) 2:13:51
8 Karl Rasmussen (Nor) 2:14:00
9 F J Cortes (Spa) 2:14:14
10 Migidio Bourifa (Ita)2:14:58
11 J Caballero (Spa) 2:15:07
12 A Di Cecco (Ita) 2:15:52
13 DaniloGoffi (Ita) 2:15:57
14 Zwierzchlewski (Fra) 2:16:00
15 Gino van Geyte (Bel)2:16:04
16 Viktor Rothlin (Sui) 2:16:16
17 Piotr Gladki (Pol) 2:17:19
18 AsafBimro (Isr) 2:17:30
19 O Andriani (Ita) 2:17:41
20 V Zabelis (Gre) 2:19:31
21 Sergio Chiesa (Ita) 2:19:43
22 Vodage Zvadya (Isr) 2:20:51
23 Jose Santos(Pol) 2:20:55
24 Yrjo Pesonen (Fin) 2:22:58
25 Toni Bernado (And) 2:23:13
26 Torben Nielsen (Den)2:23:36
27 Manuel Pita (Por) 2:23:41
28 Margus Pirksaar (Spa) 2:23:51
29 Antonio Sousa (Por) 2:27:09
30 Alcidio Costa (Por) 2:27:09
31 Z Zilberstein(Geo) 2:30:10
32 Haile Satayin (Isr) 2:30:38
Dnf:
Guy Fays (Bel)
Sreten Ninkovic (Yug)