Epic Failure

A day of highs and lows for GBR. Dina - despite a dreadful start - back on top in Europe. Will be good for her confidence after a relatively tough couple of years. She may not be quite the athlete she was in 2019 but she's still one of Europe's best and deserved the chance to show it. Amy Hunt creditable although I still think 200m is her better event. A fine bronze for Lizzie Bird, and in an Olympic Q to boot. Two birds with one stone and all that. Charlie Dobson looked very relaxed for a 44.65 showing. But with both him and MHS I'm convinced injury related disaster is only a stride away, so I'm not going to get excited until the final is over. Strong stuff in the half marathon. Happy for Georgia Bird but hugely disappointed in/for Jemma Reekie - that was a championship opportunity that went begging. Katie Snowden also sub par. Likewise Giles. Jake Norris will be disappointed in the final performance but overall a creditable performance in his first senior champs. Morgan Lake performed about as well as can be expected - she's just a step behind the top tier. But she's rarely actively bad. Good from Laviai. Less good from Vicky. Less said about the 200m guys the better.

As I said before, I'm not convinced there was much to the push. I think Reekie was going backwards. I think she was hoping that she could steal a gold here by having too much of a kick for Ciara in the home straight in a relatively slow race (turned out the exact opposite!) I doubt she's thinking of 1500m in Paris - thus far in her career she's not shown that she has the stamina to stay with the very best over that distance. 800m she's still the best of the rest behind the Big 3 for me.

aye, if she can put the first 40 of the SF and the last 60 of the final into one race, there's a good time there.

Well, there's that as well. But even still, he and Reekie had the same problem - no kick to call on in the home straight. That steeple DSQ is very, very harsh, especially with the leniency being shown in the sprints.

Terrible start from Dina there but maybe showing some of the strength that she has been working on over the summer.

Don't think the push was much to be honest, Reekie was losing momentum already by that point. Poor run from her, in a race that should have worked to her advantage. All credit to Mageean (and Bell). Ran their own races and reaped the rewards.

He's been running 1500m for most of this season, so it's possible that his kick just isn't there anymore against some of these guys.

Vicky O has looked relatively poor all season. The only potential silver lining is that she may be employing the same tactics that her sister used, which was expert at timing a season's efforts to get the best at the biggest champs. That's what we have to hope.

When? In Gwangju? They really didn't. Also, speaking about things isn't the same as protesting at a competition. If you are talking about recent events, James Guy and Adam Peaty spoke out, but Peaty's comments were as much a criticism of World Aquatics as anything. Either way, all of those things, bar Scott in 2019, are a long way from protesting every interview or every podium, as you are suggesting is going to happen this summer.

I mean Duncan Scott did his podium protest against Sun Yang in Gwangju. But that's the only one I can remember. Certainly isn't a record of mass protests or anything like that.

The placing table all week has had 49 events listed, which would include the team events. I was surprised at that as well, given the history. But I'm not complaining, given the ability to bump our total.

It keeps changing. I swear a minute or two ago the Spanish and German medals were showing. And now they've disappeared as well!

The medal table is now showing all the team medals except our gold. I'm beginning to think the web admin is holding a grudge against us...

A good day today for sure. Silver for Mills was always his limit unless Jakob had done a Belgium and fallen into the water jump by mistake somehow. Glave might on another day have got higher up but certainly no disgrace in either performance or time. Lincoln will be frustrated that he couldn't translate his circuit distances into a championship performance, but 4th place in that field is creditable anyway. Both Sember and Fincham-Dukes would have had to pull out career best performances to get any higher. No disgrace there. Callum Wilkinson was another creditable performance in the walk. O'Dowda likely sealed an Olympic place with her PB in the Hept. All in all, the positive definitely outweighed the negatives today. Meanwhile, in Oregon, Amber Anning finished 3rd in the NCAAs in 49.59, as well as running a 50.3 opening leg in the 4x400m (and also anchoring the 4x100 team!)

GB in men's basketball won 1 game by 30 pts (vs China) and lost by 1 pt to the silver medalists Spain. Our women lost all their games but even they were competitive. Now our handball teams, they *were* outclassed.

Pakistan lost to Zimbabwe in the last T20 world cup. Go and look at that Zimbabwe team and tell me how many of them would get in a combined team. Hell, go back to the 2007 50-over WC and do the same with Ireland and that Pakistan team. There's a real difference between acknowledging that Indian money greatly influences the ICC and thinking that means that they are dictating the results in some kind of Machiavellian plot. If that was the case, why did they wait until 2024 to do it? And, again, why wouldn't they spend the money to bribe one of the US tv networks to cover the game? That would be more effective in getting eyes on the product. Sometimes the most simple explanation can be the right one. And the simplest explanation is that Pakistan are notorious for being inconsistent.

A magnificent 7 from Sandra.

I did wonder if Mills might have turned up in a ginger wig and a skirt, just to freak Jakob out a bit.

He was always the overwhelming favourite, but the 5k runners had one shot to beat him, which was to take it out much harder. They have played even more into the 1500 runners in the field.

So, Jakob is definitely winning this with this early (lack of) pace.

2022 was a non-Olympic Euros, so you can't really compare the two. But even with a stronger team in Munich, at the same point in 2022 we only had 2 bronze medals.

I'd like to lobby for the introduction of 4th place medals. Definitely not for any parochial reasons, no sir.

Jade O'Dowda finishes on a PB of 6314, which comfortably meets the UKA Q. Should get her a quota spot in Paris, barring a bunch of crazy heptathlon performances across the next month.

Italy always have a strong team, but they are at home so I'm sure are doubly motivated to perform. Feel sorry for Melluzzo. Looks like he was most affected by the mess the first time.

Yup. At least according to WA. Pinnock has jumped 8.40 though.