It has been some start to the year for young Polish shot-putter Konrad Bukowiecki.
After breaking the world indoor junior record using the 6kg implement with 22.48m in Torun just over a week ago, Bukowiecki, 18, returned to the city in northern Poland to compete for the first time this year with the 7.26kg device on Saturday and with it reached 20.46m, to match his European junior indoor record.
He originally set the 20.46m at the European Athletics Indoor Championships in Prague last year, when he achieved the distance twice.
Almost five years ago since Ukraine’s Olesya Povh won 60m gold at the European Athletics Indoor Championships in Paris, she showed on Saturday that she still has good speed.
Running in Zaporizhzhya, Povh, 28, won the regional indoor championships in 7.20, to move to joint top of the European Athletics rankings.
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Her victory came as she beat Viktoriya Kashcheyeva (7.59), a fine win for an athlete whose career includes European 4x100m relay gold in Barcelona 2010 and individual 100m silver in Helsinki 2012.
It was a weekend of superb performances all around by European athletes.
In Merzig, Germany's Raphael Holzdeppe, the 2013 pole vault world champion, opened his season with an excellent 5.70m from a short run up.
And while Holzdeppe triumphed, Greece’s Kostadinos Filippidis, the world indoor champion, took second (5.67m) at the Orleans Pole Vault behind China’s Xue Changrui (5.81m).
Wilma Murto ended last year by stretching the European youth pole vault best to 4.45m and in Turku on Sunday, she increased it again, this time to 4.55m, to break the national under-23 and national junior records.
Spain has two new indoor record times, with Manuel Olmedo running 2:18.24 for the 1000m in Antequera and Lucas Bua setting the 500m mark in Toledo with 1:01.84, while Ivan Horvat cleared 5.61m in Osijek for a Croatian indoor pole vault best and in Vienna..
There are 29 meetings across Europe this week, including four European Athletics Permit events at the weekend. All the information is at http://www.european-athletics.org/calendar/.