Russia have, as expected, named a strong squad for the European Athletics Team Championships in Cheboksary next weekend as they show they mean business in their bid to regain the crown.
Their team includes world long jump champion Aleksandr Menkov, double European 110m hurdles champion Sergey Shubenkov and world indoor champions Mariya Kuchina, in the high jump, and Yekaterina Koneva, in the triple jump.
We are aiming to win at the home champs. We have a team ready to gain revenge.
It is the sixth staging of the European Athletics Team Championships and Russia have been champions of this Super League on three occasions, in 2010, 2011 and 2013.
But after losing out 12 months ago by 12.5 points to Germany in Braunschweig, Russia want glory in front of their own supporters at the Olimpiyskiy Stadium on June 20-21.
Borzakovskiy made a mark in this competition when he won the 800m in Bergen in 2010 in 1:45.41, a championship record that still stands, and he sends out a squad packed with experience and medallists.
In the opening three European Athletics Team Championships, Great Britain’s Andy Turner won the 110m hurdles but Shubenkov, the double European champion, has triumphed in the last two as he now seeks that hat-trick.
Last year he won in the most of thrilling of races in beating Britain’s Will Sharman and France’s Pascal Martinot-Lagarde.
It was the same trio again at the Zurich 2014 European Athletics Championships in August:
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Menkov set the championship’s long jump record when he won in Gateshead in 8.36m. He has a season’s best of 8.27m and will score highly.
A first time high jump clearance of 2.31m saw Daniil Tsyplakov crowned European indoor champion in Prague in March and he will be looking to repeat that success as he chases maximum points in Cheboksary, the same target for Aleksandr Gripich, who won European indoor pole vault silver in the Czech Republic.
Sergey Litvinov, in the hammer, and Aleksey Fyodorov, in the triple jump, arrive here as big players on the back of their bronze medals from last summer’s European Athletics Championships in Zurich.
Russia won six gold medals in Prague with four of those women champions now a mainstay of this team in Cheboksary.
Kuchina and Koneva triumphed for the second winter in a row after their 2013 world indoor gold and they are joined by pole vault gold medallist Anzhelika Sidorova and 3000m champion Yelena Korobkina, while long jumper Darya Klishina is the double European indoor champion who won bronze in Zurich.