Alina Reh had been 18 for only four days when she shot to the top of the European Athletics junior rankings with a 5000m run of 16:01.08 in May.
But with it came the hopes she had spoken about six months earlier when she had just missed out on a medal at the SPAR European Athletics Cross Country Championships in Samokov.
As she chatted, breathlessly, after finishing fourth in the junior race, winning a team bronze but missing out on an individual medal, Germany’s Reh looked to the future, and in particular this month’s European Athletics Junior Championships in Eskilstuna.
She said: 'Next year I want to go to Sweden and there I want to run the 5000m and maybe I can get a medal or something like that.'
If she does, it will be in the last individual women’s race of the championships and will showcase Reh for the talent she is.
On season’s times, she is by far the fastest junior at the distance with Great Britain’s Grace Baker, 19, second on the rankings with 16:19.66 - and just for good measure, Reh also tops the 3000m lists with 9:08.27 from June, a run that puts her 19th on the main overall rankings.
An excellent combination over two distances where endurance is important but equally the need for speed over the last two laps can be so vital.
And you suspect Reh also has a point to prove after missing out by nine seconds on the top three in Samokov as she finished in 14:34 as Türkiye’s Emine Hatun Tuna won in 14:13 followed by British pair Jessica Judd in 14:18 and Lydia Turner in 14:25.
Reh entered the event having been ill in the build up and she said: 'I am sad and a little bit unhappy but that is cross and maybe next year I can have a medal.'
Not that 2014 was all about disappointment as she won silver in the 3000m at the IAAF Youth Olympic Games in Nanjing in a personal best of 9:05.07.
But when you consider she has run 15:55.82 for the 5000m, that 'medal or something like that' that she spoke about should be the gold itself.