Vuković Under Two Minutes for Third Time: 12th in Europe
Croatian athlete Nina Vuković finished 12th in the 800 meters at the European Championships in Birmingham, while other Croatian representatives had mixed results.
Croatian athlete Nina Vuković finished 12th in the 800 meters at the European Championships in Birmingham, while other Croatian representatives had mixed results.
Nina Vuković once again broke the two-minute barrier in the 800 meters, but it wasn't enough for the final of the European Championships in Birmingham. The Croatian middle-distance runner from Velika Gorica clocked 1:59.10 in the semifinals on Thursday afternoon, securing 12th place in Europe.
For a full 39 years, no Croatian female athlete had run the 800 meters under two minutes. Vuković changed that on August 1, 2026, when she set a time of 1:59.05 in Belgium, moving to second on Croatia's all-time list.
On Tuesday, before the semifinals in Birmingham, she lowered her time to 1:58.38 and advanced to the semifinals of the European Championships. This was the first time in her career that she had qualified from the heats at a major championship.
In the semifinals, Vuković had the ninth-fastest qualifying time overall. However, Gabija Galvidytė from Lithuania and Audrey Werro from Switzerland, who fell 100 meters before the finish in their heat, were later reinstated into the final.
Werro, the world's fastest this season and third-fastest all-time with a time of 1:53.80, had a particularly dramatic wait for the appeal to be resolved. With stars like Keely Hodgkinson and Femke Broeders-Bol, one of Europe's top female athletes who made the transition from the 400 meters this year, 1:59.10 simply wasn't fast enough.
Behind Vuković, who is coached by Igor Čordaš at Dinamo-Zrinjevac, lie two remarkable weeks in which she set personal bests twice and competed in a European Championship semifinal for the first time in her career.
Veronika Drljačić from AK Zagreb competed in the 400-meter semifinals. With her season's best time (51.61), she finished seventh in the first semifinal heat, placing 19th overall among 24 sprinters.
Karlo Marciuš and Bruno Belčić failed to advance from the heats. Marciuš finished 21st out of 24 runners in the 200 meters with a time of 21.34, while Belčić had the slowest time among the 32 finishers in the 3000-meter steeplechase, clocking 9:00.76.
The fourth day of the European Athletics Championships in Birmingham featured the awarding of seven titles, reports Corriere della Sera. The schedule included finals in the women's 200 meters, men's 800 meters, women's triple jump, women's pole vault, women's 3000-meter steeplechase, men's discus throw, and the decathlon.
Italian athlete Francesco Pernici competed in the men's 800-meter final, while his compatriot Eloisa Coiro ran in the semifinals. Dariya Derkach and Erika Saraceni competed in the triple jump, and Fausto Desalu ran in the 200-meter semifinals. Dario Dester and Alberto Nonino took part in the decathlon, as reported by journalist Salvatore Riggio.
