It was a busy weekend, a time of year when the road season is coming to a close and the track and field events are growing week by week.
But it remains a good time again for Great Britain’s Gemma Steel, whose winter brought superb success when she won individual silver and team gold at the SPAR European Cross Country Championships in Belgrade back in December.
Over five months on, she was successful again on Sunday when she won the women’s race over 10 miles at the Bupa Great Edinburgh Run, taking victory in 56:06 as she beat Susan Partridge, who was second in 56:25.
It was an important race for Steel who had to pull out of making her marathon debut in London a fortnight earlier because of a calf problem.
Speaking to Greatrun.org, she said: 'It was so nice just to get a race in and be back in the mix with the other girls. I wasn’t going to break any records. It’s just good to see where I am racing-wise.”
In the men’s race Chris Thompson, the 2010 European 10,000m silver medallist who was ninth in London in his first marathon this month, won in 49:36 from Lee Merrien in 49:54.
He said: 'I’m probably going to still feel London for the next couple of weeks. I can’t believe I ran 49 minutes. It felt like we were running at 52 minute pace, which is a good sign. I just need to freshen up and bring out that fitness for the summer.'
There was home win in the women’s race at the Enschede Marathon - and a local one, too, as Reina Visser, who was born in the Dutch city, triumphed in 2:42:06 while in La Coruí±a, Spain’s Rafael Iglesias won the 3rd Maraton de A Coruí±a in 2:15:56. But he was left knowing he still has more to do to make it to the European Athletics Championships in Zurich where the qualifying mark is 2:13:00.
In Kyiv, Ukrainians Dmytro Pozhevilov, in 2:30:21, and Larysa Labartkava, in 2:54:23, won the Wizz Air Kyiv City Marathon and in Padova, there was a home win for Italy’s Fatna Maraoui in the St Antonio Marathon in 2:36:32 as she beat Portugal´s Vera Nuners in 2:39:30.
France’s Larbi Es Raidi won the 34th Nantes Marathon in 2:16:09 and by the closest possible margin beating Ethiopian Moti Mekonen who finished with 2:16:10.
In Barcelona, Spain’s Abdelaziz Merzogoui won the road mile in 4:16 from Adel Mechaal and Artur Bossy, both in 4:19, with Solange Pereira taking the women’s race in 4:49.
Sindre Buraas won the Sentrumslopet 10km race in Oslo 29:39 and staying in Norway, there was further home success as Urige Buta triumphed in the 8.2km Siddisløpet in Stavanger with 24:09.
Türkiye’s Bahar Dogan won the women’s Istanbul Half Marathon in 1:16:33 and in Italy, at the 3rd Chia Laguna Half-Marathon, Claudia Pinna gave the local crowd something to celebrate as she won in 1:09:38.
Stockholm was the venue for the Women’s Health Half Marathon which saw Sweden’s marathon record-holder Isabellah Andersson win in 1:16:02 while in Zhukovskiy, at the Russian Cross Country Championships, there were men's wins for Aleksey Popov in the 2km in 11:19, Yegor Nikolayev over 8km in 23:33, and in the women’s events, Lyudmila Lebedeva won the 2km in 5:58 with Alla Kulyatina taking the 6km title in 19:47.
After his victory in the shopping mall event in Jordan Creek, Renaud Lavillenie repeated his success in Des Moines as the action moved to the track at the 105th Drake Relays, and once more, the pole vault indoor world record-holder beat Britain’s Steve Lewis on countback.
The Frenchman triumphed after both men went over at 5.70m and Spain’s European high jump champion Ruth Beitia was fifth with 1.93m as American Chaunte Lowe won with 1.96m.
In Drazevina, Croatia’s Nedzad Mulabegovic won the International Shot put meeting with an effort of 20.55m while in Gabrovo, Bulgaria’s Georgi Ivanov, their shot put record-holder, opened the outdoor season with 20.12m.
At the Shukevich Memorial throwing meeting in Brest, Ukraine’s Oleksiy Sokyrskyy, who was fourth in the hammer at the Olympics in London, won with 73.94m with teammate Iryna Novozhylova taking the women’s title with 69.38m.
The men’s shot put was won by Belarusian Mikhail Abramchuk with 19.60m and the women’s event saw another home victory as Yulia Leontsyuk won with 18.61m, while Ukrainian Maksym Bohdan took the men’s javelin with 81.30m and Tatyana Kholodovich, also of Belarus, won the women’s with 59.95m.
THE WEEK AHEAD
Tuesday - Memorial ‘Veselin Daskalov” (Lukovit).
Wednesday - Youth Memorial “Tsvetanka Hristova” (Sofia).
Thursday - 20th International Meeting (Bar), Memorial “Boris Muleshkov” (Panagyuriste).
Friday-Saturday - 27th Multistars-Trofeo Zerneri Acciai.
Saturday-Sunday - IAAF World Race Walking Cup (Taicang).
Saturday - 58th International Phoenix Marchen (Vallensbaek), Agram 2014 International Meeting (Zagreb), IAAF World Race Walking Cup (Taicang), Split Half Marathon.
Sunday - 10k Femenino Internacional (Valencia), Athens Half Marathon, Haspa Marathon Hamburg, Moscow International Half Marathon, Salzburg Marathon.
Monday - Belfast Marathon.