It was a weekend when the fast stars of Europe showed that they are preparing for another spectacular summer.
That was no better evident than in Hengelo at the FBK Games where Dafne Schippers, of the Netherlands, and Dina Asher-Smith, of Great Britain, both broke national 100m records.
Schippers, the European 100m and 200m champion and 60m indoor champion, powered to victory in 10.94, taking her mark down by 0.09, for the best run by a European for 10 years, as Asher-Smith produced 11.02, an improvement of 0.12.
It was some race, with Asher-Smith’s British teammate Asha Philip taking third in a personal best of 11.10.
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'Delicious' was one of the words that Schippers used to describe her delight as she moved to 14th on the European all-time list. She took to Twitter to react to the race as well, describing herself as 'super happy'.
It was the same one-two as in Prague in March, with Asher-Smith, the world junior champion and European junior 200m champion, now the fastest British woman after beating Montell Douglas’ time of 11.05 from 2008.
Asher-Smith said: 'I really wasn't expecting to run that time with the kind of race that I ran so I was really happy. I have a few things to work on so I think that points to me being able to replicate and do a bit better later in the season.'
Schippers has become an unbeatable force in the sprints and now it is time for a diversion. This weekend she is heading back to the event where she was once better known, the heptathlon, as she competes against Britain’s Olympic heptathlon champion Jessica Ennis-Hill in Gotzis.
It was quite a meeting for the Dutch as Sifan Hassan broke the national 1000m record with victory in 2:34.69 as she beat Poland’s Joanna Jozwik in 2:35.57 and Britain’s Jenny Meadows in 2:36.13.
Vicaut powers to European lead
As Schippers was setting the standard for the rest of Europe’s women, France’s Jimmy Vicaut was doing the same for the men at the French Interclubs meeting in Tourcoing.
He won the 100m in a European lead of 10.02 and Christophe Lemaitre was second in 10.23, having also finished in that spot in the 200m in 21.11 as Guy-Elphege Anouman won in 20.89.
Borlee breaks 45 seconds
The IFAM Outdoor meeting in Oordegem was all about European leads, too, as Belgium’s Jonathan Borlee broke 45 seconds for the first time since 2013 as he won the 400m in 44.91 as Britain’s Alison Leonard ran 2:00.50 to move to the top of the 800m tree.
Arhus action
And the European season’s list saw a new top mark in the women’s 400m hurdles at the Nordic Challenge in Arhus as Denmark’s Sara Petersen won in 55.73 from Poland’s Joanna Linkiewicz in 56.87.
Gyuratz improves mark
In Budapest, Reka Gyuratz improved the Hungarian junior and under-23 hammer record with 70.39m at the 42nd Paulinyi Memorial and in Warsaw, Poland’s Konrad Bukowiecki took his discus personal best to 60.15m.
Another Ingebrigtsen
Now, who will end up the quickest in the Ingebrigtsen family?
Jakob, 15, is the younger brother of 2012 European 1500m champion Henrik and Filip and in Hamar on Saturday, he produced a superb Norwegian age best of 3:57.58, breaking the national mark of 4:01.30 which Fredrik Naslund set in 1993.
A holder of the European age bests at 11 and 12 for the distance, he told aftenbladet.no: 'Training sessions in the past have been very encouraging and I had every confidence that I would be able to lower the time quite radically.'
There are 64 meetings in Europe this week. For full details, go to www.european-athletics.org/calendar.