{"id":589547,"date":"2026-08-11T03:56:13","date_gmt":"2026-08-11T03:56:13","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/589547\/"},"modified":"2026-08-11T03:56:13","modified_gmt":"2026-08-11T03:56:13","slug":"jakob-ingebrigtsen-storms-to-5000m-victory-on-opening-night-of-european-athletics-championships-the-irish-times","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/589547\/","title":{"rendered":"Jakob Ingebrigtsen storms to 5,000m victory on opening night of European Athletics Championships \u2013 The Irish Times"},"content":{"rendered":"

Rarely if ever has the opening night of the European Athletics Championships<\/a> produced a more sensational victory than Jakob Ingebrigtsen, the Norwegian<\/a> star winning his fourth successive 5,000m with a breathtaking display of sheer running audacity which, even by his own standards, seemed incompressible.<\/p>\n

Because in his first race over any distance in 11 months, and six months after undergoing surgery on his Achilles tendon, Ingebrigtsen appeared to have lured the entire field into believing he was still far off his best.<\/p>\n

There was a trio of Irish runners among them, Nick Griggs, Darragh McElhinney and Brian Fay all running confidently near the front early on as the 23-man field were soon strung out like beads on a string.<\/p>\n

By the end, most of them were on the flat of their back, utterly exhausted by sheer ferocity of the endgame. Ingebrigtsen didn\u2019t go anywhere near the front until three laps to go, then bided his time as the big kickers made their move, before he finally hit the front inside the last 20m.<\/p>\n

Winning in 13:15.29, it was the most supreme win of his now seven European outdoor titles \u2013 plus seven more consecutive indoor titles.<\/p>\n

Florian Bremm of Germany held on for second in 13:15.60, while Griggs finished up the best of the Irish in eighth place, clocking 13:21.07, despite losing one of his spikes with four laps to go. Fay came home in 14th in 13:31.15, with McElhinney falling back to 18th in 13:37.62. Jimmy Gressier from France, the world 10,000m champion who made his move with 800m to go, ended up fourth.<\/p>\n

\"Ireland’sIreland\u2019s Nick Griggs loses his shoe during the race men’s 5,000m final. Photograph: Morgan Treacy <\/p>\n

It wasn\u2019t the only European title for Norway on the opening night \u2013 as their mixed relay team also won gold, succeeding Ireland as champions.<\/p>\n

By her own admission, Sarah Lavin has endured a turbulent season so far, reflected in her below-par performance in the 100m hurdles, the 32-year-old sixth in her heat in 13.07 seconds. After parting with long-time coach Noelle Morrissey back in March, then spending some time with John Coghlan in Hong Kong, Lavin came to Birmingham without any coach.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s been a very turbulent couple of weeks, couple of months,\u201d she said. \u201cA lot of different scenarios, and things to overcome, But I\u2019m proud that I got to the line. I kind of know what I can do to fix this, and unfortunately it\u2019s time.\u201d<\/p>\n

In the field, Nicola Tuthill did enough to qualify for the hammer final, the 22-year-old from Bandon throwing a best of 70.09m, which ranked her eighth of the 12 qualifiers. With a season best 72.73m, there\u2019s possibly more to come there.<\/p>\n

Eric Favors also progressed to the 12-man final of the shot put with his first-round effort of 19.54m. The 29-year-old Favors, born in New York and with a grandmother from Mayo, then finished 10th best in the final, with a slightly further throw of 19.59m<\/p>\n

If qualifying from the first-round heat is about impressing the most, while exerting the least, Mark English did exactly that when winning his 800m heat with ease earlier on Monday, laying down his clear medal intentions in the process.<\/p>\n

The expectation that Cian McPhillips would then follow English into Wednesday\u2019s semi-finals was dashed when he trailed home at the back of his heat, the Longford athlete appearing a pale shadow of himself after picking up a virus just under a week ago. McPhillips finished seventh in 1:46,84, that heat won by Britain\u2019s Max Burgin in 1:45.80.<\/p>\n

His coach Joe Ryan explained that McPhillips felt the onset of the illness last Wednesday, and although hopeful he may have recovered in time, it was evident once he started to lose going around the top bend that he was well of his best.<\/p>\n

English was out in the first of the four heats, the Donegal athlete needing a top-three finish to advance automatically to Wednesday\u2019s semi-final. He didn\u2019t take any chances, staying close to the front around the first lap, then cruising to the front down the home straight, winning in 1:46.96.<\/p>\n

\u201cI feel really good, t was just a matter of getting the job done today and managed to do it, and we move on to the semi-final Wednesday,\u201d said English, the 33-year-old having the best season of his life.<\/p>\n

\u201cObviously I\u2019ve the fastest time [in Europe this year], but it\u2019s not a matter of that being a given to get anywhere. Everyone starts at zero, so I\u2019ll just look to go to the semi-final and execute my race plan again, and hopefully it works out.<\/p>\n

Those contrasting fortunes continued in the heats of the women\u2019s 100m, when Ciara Neville, aided by a notable tailwind, finished fifth. The top-12 fastest times from the three heats all progressed to the semi-finals, and Neville ended up 10th best with her time of 11.29 seconds. The Limerick athlete later finished eighth in her semi-final, clocking 11.57.<\/p>\n

\"Ireland’sIreland\u2019s Lauren Roy in action during the first round of the women’s 100m race on Monday. Photograph: Morgan Treacy\/Inpho <\/p>\n

Lauren Roy just missed out, finishing sixth in her heat in 11.32, and with that the Ballymena athlete ended up 15th overall. Somewhat controversially, Neville\u2019s race was run with the stronger tailwind, (+3.2m\/s), compared to Roy (+1.8m\/s), raising question marks over why European Athletics opted to progress athletes on times, rather than positions.<\/p>\n

\u201cIf I had have been in an earlier heat that had a plus-three [tailwind], I probably would have run a lot faster,\u201d said Roy, \u201cso it sucks. But I\u2019ll be back for the 200m.\u201d <\/p>\n

Jack Raftery made the absolute most of his chance of progressing in the 400m, also based on the top-12 times, when he nailed second place in his heat in 45.81 seconds and the 25-year-old now joins the semi-finals line-up on Tuesday night. In the heats of the women\u2019s steeplechase, Abbie Sheridan finished in 14th, running 9:57.60.<\/p>\n

Tuesday: Irish in action11.15am: Men\u2019s 100m round one: Bori Akinola (Israel Olatunde bye)7.25pm: Women\u2019s 5,000m final: Sarah Healy8.32pm: Men\u2019s 100m semi-finals: Israel Olatunde, Bori Akinola*9pm: Men\u2019s 400m semi-finals: Jack Raftery9.47pm: Men\u2019s 100m final: Israel Olatunde, Bori Akinola*<\/p>\n

*pending qualification<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Rarely if ever has the opening night of the European Athletics Championships produced a more sensational victory than…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":589548,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[9],"tags":[163615,61,60,298,112],"class_list":["post-589547","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-sports","tag-european-athletics-championships","tag-ie","tag-ireland","tag-norway","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/589547","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=589547"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/589547\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/589548"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=589547"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=589547"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=589547"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}