Defending senior women’s champion Nadia Battocletti has found a familiar feeling at the course for Sunday’s (14) Lagoa 2025 SPAR European Cross Country Championships.
The SPAR European Cross Country Championships will be streamed live on the European Athletics website from 8:55am local time (9:55am CET).
The 25-year-old Italian, currently the European champion on cross country, track (5000m and 10,000m) and road (10km), compared the Lagoa Urban Park and Congress Centre to a park near her home in the Trentino region of Italy.
“I like (it) a lot, also, because it's similar to the park near my home,” she said at the official press conference on Saturday (13) of the winding course mixing grass and stone chips.
“It's a memory for me when I was young and I was playing with all my all my friends, And also, two weeks ago, I run in a race on the course was really similar to this one. So I hope I am prepared.”
Focus and then push
She also revealed that her travelling fan club will be on hand to cheer her on towards what they hope will be further honours to add to the growing collection for the Olympic and world 10,000m silver medallist.
“Here, there are about 10 people,” she said. “My mom is the President, and they made a cap and also t shirt, and a lot of flags.”
Although she had yet to confirm her tactics for Sunday’s race, where she will start as the overwhelming favourite, she gave some hints of what to expect having had a closer inspection of the course.
“Probably the best tactics is to focus and stay concentrated and then push and in particular, in the last part of course, that will be very fast,” she suggested.
