As expected Russian Yuriy Borzakovskiy won gold in 1:48.55 , virtually as he wanted, with Spain’s young hope, Luis Alberto Marco, in silver and Sweden’s Mattias Claesson collecting bronze. 

“This is my second medal in the Europeans,” said the winner. “It came after a long nine years. Everything is different now, especially the runners. It was very easy for me to lead the race because I train to run much faster.”

The start of this race was a carbon copy of the women’s with two men, Marco and Borzakovskiy, determined to dominate the pace from the start. Unlike the women’s race, though, the pace was not suicidal.

The Spaniard rushed into an early lead but at the 150m mark Borzakovskiy came onto his shoulder and stayed there through 200m in 27.52.

At 300m the Russian took over, as he did in the semi. Better to dominate the pace and then decide how you want to win. Not many people can do that of course, but Borzakovskiy is in a different league.

Behind, Claesson was starting to manoeuvre himself into position. He had looked powerful in the semis and had dominated much in the manner of Borzakovskiy and was clearly seriously eyeing a medal.

At 400m the order was a cool looking Borzakovskiy, the Swede and Marco moving smoothly. The die was cast for gold, but it was anybody’s guess where the minor medals would go.

The bell was reached in 1:23.55 with Borzakovskiy now flying and the second Spaniard, Manuel Olmedo shooting into second ahead of Claesson.
But Marco was not yet finished and he slid smoothly back into the silver medal position. Try as he might, though, he was making no impression on Borzakovskiy.

Into the straight and Marco was at full stretch but safe in silver as Claesson used his strength to snatch bronze. It was the first medal of any kind for Sweden’s men at this distance in the European Indoor championships.

But the race belonged to the Athens Olympic champion who collected gold once again after his previous win nine years ago.