Italy’s 15-year-old sprint sensation Kelly Doualla Edimo won her women’s 100m semifinal at the Tampere 2025 European Athletics U20 Championships on Thursday to stay in contention for another accolade.
Tampere 2025 is being live streamed on the European Athletics website courtesy of Eurovision Sport.
The recent winner at the European Youth Olympic Festival in Skopje in a European U18 best of 11.21 looked in full control as she won the second semi final in 11.56 (-0.3m/s).
Great Britain’s Mabel Akande won the first semi in 11.48 (-0.2m/s) and Ukraine’s Uliana Stepaniuk won the third semifinal in a personal best 11.50 (+0.7m/s), as each of the finalists offered glimpses of their potential ahead of Friday’s final.
In the men’s semifinals, Ylann Bizasene qualified fastest, winning the third semifinal in 10.35 (-0.5m/s). His French teammate Lenny Chanteur also made it through to Friday’s final, placing second in the first semifinal in 10.61 (-0.1m/s) despite losing a shoe before the finish.
British athletes dominate the middle distance heats
Tom Waterworth and Rafferty Mirfin headed the qualifiers in the men’s 800m, winning heat two and heat three respectively. Waterworth’s winning time of 1:47.83 was the fastest time ever run in a heat at a European Athletics U20 Championships.
The women’s 1500m qualifiers were led by Eleanor Strevens and Lyla Belshaw, who were first and second in heat one. Strevens won by just 0.04 in 4:20.70.
Serbia’s European U18 champion Aldin Catovic breezed through to Saturday’s men’s 3000m final, winning heat one in 8:17.71.
World U20 champion Méta Tumba of France safely progressed in the women’s 400m hurdles, jogging home to win heat six in 59.35. Romania’s Alexandra Stefania Uta was quickest overall, winning heat one in 57.64.
Van Daalen on track for throws double
Having safely navigated the shot put qualifiers in the morning session, the Netherlands’ Jarno van Daalen made light work of the men’s discus qualifiers in the evening session to keep a throws’ double within his sights.
The Dutch athlete, world U20 silver medallist in the discus, landed a first-round throw of 60.73m to book his place in Saturday’s final. Even more impressively, Poland’s Jakub Rodziak threw 61.59m, the only athlete to better the automatic qualifying distance of 61.00m.
The women’s javelin qualifiers were led by European U18 bronze medallist Rabiye Çiçek of Türkiye with a personal best of 55.95m. Vita Barbic of Croatia, gold medallist at the European Athletics U18 Championships in Banska Bystrica last year, also qualified safely in third place with a best of 52.49m.