Track and Field
Schlussläuferin Salomé Kora bringt nach schwachem Wechsel doch noch Silber ins Ziel
Image: Keystone
The Swiss women’s 4×100-meter relay team won silver at the European Championships in Birmingham, and Dominic Lobalu proved to be a reliable performer as well. Annik Kälin doesn’t view the fourth-place finish entirely negatively. Reactions from Saturday night.
Today at 00:34“It’s the pressure that’s been weighing on us for years, and now it’s just lifting,” said Salomé Kora after finishing in second place and winning the silver medal. The 32-year-old, who has been part of the Swiss relay team for many years and is known as the “relay mom,” was overcome with emotion during an interview with the SRF reporter. “We finally have this medal. I’m completely overwhelmed by my emotions. It’s so wonderful to be here with the girls and to have this medal.”
“We’ve known for years that we actually have what it takes. But somehow, we could never show it on the track,” the athlete from Eastern Switzerland reflected. “Today we had such a good vibe in the team, such a great atmosphere. Everyone was ready. It felt like things could only turn out well.”
Léonie Pointet also struggled to control her emotions after the final. She and Kora had almost messed up the last handoff. “I just kept shouting, ‘Stop, stop.’ I saw that Salomé was too far away,” she said, describing the decisive moment when Switzerland—clearly in second place—was in danger of being eliminated. “Usually, they were always tears of sadness. Now they’re tears of joy and emotion. It’s unbelievable,” the Swiss athlete from the French-speaking part of the country gushed.
Compensated for 4th place
Géraldine Di Tizio-Frey was at her wits’ end. The anchor runner had noticed the problems during the final handoff and didn’t know whether Switzerland would be disqualified. “I couldn’t bring myself to look at the scoreboard anymore,” she said, describing those anxious minutes of waiting. There was a very good reason for this: At the 100-meter mark, she had already been shown in third place, only to slip back to fourth place.
Fabienne Hoenke, who joined the team for the final in place of Ajla Del Ponte, also received a reward for her strong performances in Birmingham in the form of a medal. In the 200-meter race, she finished fourth after a poor start and was unable to contend for the bronze medal.
The general sense of relief stems from the background to this event. For years, the Swiss women have been among the world’s elite, but they had never managed to win a medal at the major championships. The fact that a modest time was enough this time around no longer matters. At the 2016 Olympics, a time of 43.12 seconds had been enough for 11th place; now, that same time has earned her a silver medal at the European Championships.
Lobalu is happy, too
Dominic Lobalu also left the track with a silver medal and no regrets about not successfully defending his European Championship title in the 10,000 meters. During the race, the 27-year-old realized that Andreas Almgren was simply too strong that evening, so he shifted his focus to finishing in second place. “I’ve learned to be patient. At the 7-kilometer mark, I felt it was better to secure the medal. After all, there are still many races ahead.”
Even before the race began, he believed he had a chance. “When I saw the final start list, I knew I could win a medal.”
The trend is upward
Annik Kälin, on the other hand, had to settle for fourth place. The 26-year-old from Graubünden missed the podium in the heptathlon despite a strong total of 6,630 points. Nevertheless, she balanced her immediate frustration with a positive assessment of her progress. “With a score like that, you have to be satisfied. A medal would have been nice, of course—that’s still a possibility. But even fourth place motivates me to keep at it, to get better, and to raise my level even higher.”
Kälin had already scored more points twice this season, remains the world’s top performer this year, and had traveled to Birmingham with high hopes. Her fourth-place finish doesn’t change her overall trajectory. “My performance this year is clearly on the rise. I can build on that.”