Peak performance all over Europe
In many countries, the last competition weekend at which top European athletes could still qualify for Paris took place on Polytan surfaces. For many athletes from all over Europe, it was the culmination of four years of extraordinary effort and concentration to secure their place at the Summer Games in Paris. The Eintracht Stadium in Braunschweig, Manchester Regional Arena and the FBK Stadium in Hengelo, the Netherlands, represented the Paris hopes of three of the biggest track-and-field nations in Europe.
Eintracht Stadium, Braunschweig, Germany
Paris is the goal. And everyone wants to be there – including the German track-and-field athletes. For them, the 124th German Athletics Championships were a decisive step towards the Summer Games 2024.
Expectations were high. After all, the German Athletics Association (DLV) plans to take 75 to 80 athletes to the games. For many candidates, the competition on 28th and 30th June 2024 at the 24,000-person Braunschweig Stadium was the final showdown on the “Road to Paris”. Sprinter Owen Ansah stood out as one of the absolute top performances with a time of 9.99 seconds – the first 100-metre time from a German sprinter below the magical 10-second mark For Owen Ansah, this meant a direct nomination for the Summer Games.
He achieved this performance on our Polytan Rekortan M, which bears the word “record” in its name for good reason. The surface in capri blue is super fast and offers perfect tread elasticity, thanks to its exceptional sport medical properties. This benefited all the athletes in Braunschweig and attested to the world’s most certified athletics track’s proven performance in competitions worldwide. We installed the track at Eintracht Stadium in 2020, in the course of a complete renovation of the synthetic surfaces.
Still at the stadium, Owen Ansah reflected on the historic moment in an interview with the DLV and expressed his appreciation for the track: “It had to happen at some point. Today it happened, and I am mega happy to have been the first. But it hasn’t sunk in yet. I first need to sit down and see the time in black and white. I felt top and, apart from that, I love blue tracks like this one.”
European long jump champion Malaika Mihambo, on the other hand, had to cancel her appearance at the German Championships in Braunschweig. She had contracted Covid directly after the European Championships in Rome. Previously, she had won a gold medal with a jump of 7.22 metres, the second longest of her career, winning her the title of European champion. However, Malaika Mihambo and Mikaelle Assani were subsequently nominated for the Games in Paris – just like our brand ambassador Laura Raquel Müller, whose performance has progressed in leaps and bounds this year.
There’s a rollercoaster of emotions behind the only 20-year-old athlete. The Hohenlohe local had fallen in the rain at Braunschweig, an unlucky trip on the edge of the long jump pit. Laura Raquel Müller herself said with a wink: “These were my most famous championships; I’ve never stood out that much before.”
Nevertheless, the third-best long jumper in the U20s European Championships is on her way to Paris, thanks to her best performance of 6.81 metres during the indoor season in Dortmund – also delivered on a Polytan surface, Rekortan PUR, on which she even beat Malaika Mihambo. And if that wasn’t enough: Laura Raquel Müller also uses Polytan surfaces to train. Both the running track at the Training Centre in Stuttgart and the track at her home club of TSG Öhringen are produced by Polytan. Thanks to the improvement in her performance this year, the German Athletics Association recommended Laura Raquel Müller for Paris, and the German Sports Federation (DOSB) has now confirmed the nomination. This make her one of three long jumpers who will compete for Germany.
One athlete who already had her ticket to the Summer Games in the bag was Gina Lückenkemper. Despite this, she delivered a gripping photo finish in the women’s 100-metre final and won her seventh German Championship title. With her winning time of 11.04 seconds, she once again exceeded the expected standard. The current vice European javelin champion Julian Weber won his fourth German Championship title in a row with a throw of 86.63 metres. His results in Braunschweig showed just how uncontested his victory was: any one of his throws, which all landed beyond the 80-metre mark, would have been enough to win. This despite having to throw with a shortened run-up due to the stadium layout.
Manchester Regional Athletics Arena, Great Britain
It was not only in Braunschweig that athletes competed for the highly sought-after tickets: the dress rehearsal for Paris also took place in other European countries. For example, in Great Britain, where Manchester Regional Athletics Arena served as the stage for Britain’s best athletes. At the 6,500-person stadium, they competed for 40 national titles and a place at the summer games in Paris. On Polytan tracks, of course: our Rekortan M in Hertha blue was the undeniable visual highlight of the competition.
Athletically, Phoebe Gills stood out for her spectacular victory in the women’s 800 metres. The talented 17-year-old delivered a breath-taking performance on the track and secured her place in Paris by claiming the gold medal with a time of 1:58:66. At the same time, Gill became the youngest winner of the British championship in 50 years.
Another outstanding performance came from Matt Hudson-Smith, who claimed his first British title in the men’s 200-metre sprint. As a result, the European record holder in the 400 metres will once again run for Great Britain after an eight-year absence from the international track.
Unfortunately, our brand ambassador Katie Snowden, who finished in fifth place in Manchester, was not able to qualify for the Games in Paris: she had positioned herself well for the last round of a very tactical final. In the 1,500-metre race, in which the first four athletes all achieved the qualification time, Snowden – who represented Great Britain at the games in 2021 in Tokyo – faltered in the last 200 metres and therefore failed to qualify.
FBK Stadium in Hengelo, the Netherlands
The Dutch Athletics Championships also took place an the last weekend in June, at the FBK Stadium in Hengelo . The arena – named after the legendary athlete Fanny Blankers-Koen, who won four gold medals as the “flying housewife” at the Summer Games in London 1948, making her the superstar of the tournament – is one of the largest athletics stadiums in the Netherlands with a capacity of 15,200.
Here too, athletes delivered one world-best performance after another. Not only that, but on an extremely economical and sustainable solution for the renovation of sports facilities. In 2018, we renovated all the running tracks and run-up tracks at the FBK Stadium with our re-topping process. This means that old, worn-out synthetic surfaces were completely technically and cosmetically restored. It also allowed the existing elastic substructures to remain in place, rather than being disposed of, making the renovation process in Hengelo exceptionally economical and sustainable.
15 national championships on Rekortan in 2024
The British, Dutch and German championships top off the 15 national championships that took place on Rekortan surfaces this year. From Oceania to Asia, from Europe to the Middle East, our Rekortan surfaces were the stage for national championships on four continents. This year, the traditional events were even more significant for athletes who had their sights on Paris. Congratulations to all the athletes who qualified for the Summer Games during these events. We wish them all the best as they make their way to Paris!
