Dina Asher-Smith European Champion
Second year history student and Performance Athlete Dina Asher-Smith sprinted into the history books on Thursday evening as she was crowned European Champion over 200m at the European Championships, before anchoring a further silver medal performance in the 4x100m relay on Sunday.
Watch Dina Asher-Smith's win the 2016 European Championship 200m final. Credits: IAAF Youtube Channel
Age 20, Dina becomes the first British woman to win the European 200m title.
The championships, which are taking place in Amsterdam, began on Wednesday, with qualifying rounds for the 200m semi-finals that same day. Having already run the Olympic qualifying time of 23.20s earlier this year, Dina did not compete but was given automatic qualification into the later round.
In Thursday’s semi final, the King’s Sport Performance Athlete emerged untroubled as the joint fastest qualifier with Bulgaria’s Ivet LaLova-Collio to book the top two lane spots for the evening’s final in a time of 22.57s.
In the final it was another well-executed race. A fast start gave an early advantage round the bend. From there Dina, a former 100m Junior World Champion, looked to be in command as she glided down the finishing straight to take her first senior international title in a time of 22.37s. Finishing strongly in second was Ivet Lalova-Collio for Bulgaria, while Germany’s Gina Luckenkemper was third. Fellow Britain Jodie Williams was also sixth.
Following the final, Dina took to Twitter to express her joy and thanks.
Dina returned to the track on Saturday for the qualifying rounds of the women’s 4x100m relay, with the hope of bringing back a second medal from these Championships. Backed by fellow sprinters Daryll Nieta, Asha Philip and Bianca Williams the quartet were fastest through to the following day's finals.
On Sunday the history student was once more part of an historic day for British Athletics, as the 4x100m relay team collected a silver medal, and Great Britain went onto win seven medals pushing their tally to 16 overall - the highest tally at the European Championships since 1958.
The result points to a strong athletics team set to step out into Rio's Olympic Stadium later this summer. Last month Dina’s place for this summer’s Rio Olympic Games was confirmed after she won the 200m British title at the British Championships. The Games will take place in next month, beginning on Friday 5th August and running until Sunday 21st August.
The Italian Job...
Also competing at the Championships was alumnus Antonio Infantino (Philosophy, 2012) who was making his senior international debut racing for Italy in the 200m. Enjoying a successful first outing in the colours of the azzurri, Antonio progressed to the semi-finals finishing sixth in the round's second race. Amsterdam was the first oppurtunity for Antonio, who holds dual British-Italian citizenship, to race internationally after having switched his international competition allegiance to Italy earlier in the year
Congratulations to both Dina and Antonio on their successes in Amsterdam!