Ewa Swoboda after setting a world junior indoor 60m record of 7.07 in Torun (© Maciej Pruss)
Poland’s Ewa Swoboda flew to a world U20 indoor 60m record of 7.07* on home soil at the Copernicus Cup meeting in Torun on Friday (12).
The 18-year-old European junior 100m champion got a solid start and was quickly into her running before pulling away to win by more than two metres.
The trackside clock in the Torun Sports Hall initially read 7.08 and that was enough to set Swoboda dancing with delight on the spot shortly after the finish line, waving her arms in the air, but when the time was adjusted downwards by 0.01 she sprinted off to be congratulated by her family and friends in the crowd.
"The thing that helped me most is that it's an incredibly fast track in Torun and it was great to hear the cheering of my trainer Iwona Krupa and my manager," said Swoboda. "However, this result didn't come from nowhere. It was the result of millions of workouts, blood sweat and tears and plenty of patience from my coach.
"At the moment I can't really think about what I can do in the summer but I doubt I'll go under 11 seconds this year. I think it'll be 11.15, 11.10. I am full of optimism ahead of the summer season, but don't want to get carried away.
"Now I want to get some sleep and when I wake up I'll see whether it was all a dream," she added after calming down from the initial euphoria.
The previous world U20 indoor record had been 7.09, clocked by Nigeria’s Joan Ekah at the 1999 World Indoor Championships.
Swoboda's own previous best was the Polish indoor record of 7.13 she ran last month in Luxembourg.
In addition, Swoboda now holds the world-leading time along with the Netherlands’ Dafne Schippers.
With the IAAF World U20 Championships being held in the Polish city of Bydgoszcz this summer, she will also start as the favourite for the 100m there and will inevitably be the focus of a huge amount of local attention.
Jozwik and Plis set world leads
The evening started with Renata Plis setting a world-leading time over 1500m when winning in 4:07.38. European 800m bronze medallist Joanna Jozwik followed suit over four laps of the Torun Sports Hall, winning in 2:00.12 ahead of fellow world finalist Nataliia Lupu from Ukraine, who was second in 2:00.36.
The organisers invited some tough opposition for Adam Kszczot in the men's 800m but the world silver medallist maintained his unbeaten run this winter, winning in 1:46.18. He came home ahead of Kenya’s Olympic bronze medallist Timothy Kitum, second in 1:46.72, while Ethiopia’s two-time world indoor champion Mohammed Aman faded to third in 1:47.24 on the last lap after closely tracking the pacemaker through the first half of the race.
The finishing order from Lodz last Friday was repeated in the shot put with Michal Haratyk taking the spoils with the second-longest throw of his career with 21.04m ahead of 18-year-old Konrad Bukowiecki's 20.45m, the latter just 13 centimetres away from his recent world junior indoor record, while two-time Olympic champion Tomasz Majewski improved his season’s best to 20.41m in third place.
Robert Sobera cleared 5.77m to win the pole vault on countback ahead of world bronze medallist Piotr Lisek.
Both men were over 5.77m at the first time of asking before failing at 5.82m, although Sobera saved his last effort for a unsuccessful title at 5.87m, but Lisek had failures earlier in the competition.
Phil Minshull and Steven Mills for the IAAF
*Subject to the usual ratification procedures
