23rd March 2012 05:18
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| Ukraine's Oleksiy Kasyanov has his sights set on getting on the podium at the 2012 European Athletics Championships in Helsinki. |
Ukraine's Oleksiy Kasyanov followed the fine example set by his female team mate and took the silver medal in Istanbul. He now has his sights set on also getting on the podium at the 2012 European Athletics Championships decathlon.
'Doing a decathlon at both the European Athletics Championships and the Olympic Games, which comes a month afterwards this summer, is certainly feasible and it's in my plans to do both events,' Kasyanov told European Athletics while at the World indoor Championships.
'I want to do well in Helsinki because at the last European Athletics Championships I was leading after the first day but I got injured in the 400m and could not start the second day. However, I am sure I could have got a medal there if I had not been injured.
'I got a silver medal here (in Istanbul) and I want to do better than that in Helsinki,' added Kasyanov optimistically.
Kasyanov was not only the top European heptathlete in Istanbul, he also finished the winter with a best score by a European, having achieved 6237 points at the Ukraine Cup in Zaporizhzhya last month, which was just 17 points short of his national record set at the same meeting in 2010.
Perhaps it's not surprising that he does well in Zaporizhzhya as Kasyanov now lives in the city, along with his girlfriend and fellow Ukrainian international Hanna Melnychenko who was seventh in the Istanbul pentathlon, although he hails from the town of Stahanov in the eastern part of the country.
Melnychenko has also joined his training group, guided by Kasyanov's coach Dmytro Lyopa. 'Since last autumn, I've been feeling calm and happy. I enjoy all our joint training camps and now work with double energy,' joked Kasyanov.
His medal in Istanbul followed on from his silver medal at the European Athletics Indoor Championships but his additional motivation to do well in Helsinki is due to the fact that he has never won a medal at an outdoor continental championship at any level.
'I was so glad just to receive an invitation to compete at the World Indoor Championships. I wanted to prove myself after string of failures in the international athletics arena. I went there mentally and physically ready for great fight.'
Kasyanov can boast of a decathlon personal best of 8479 points, set when finishing fourth at the 2009 World Championships, and his frustration having to pull out with a hamstring injury in Barcelona two years ago was compounded by the fact that the winning total of France's Romain Barras was 26 points short of that mark.
Barras is expected to defend his title in Helsinki although groin problems at the end of last summer meant he decided not to compete indoor this winter.
However, a potential new Helsinki foe for both Kasyanov and Barras emerged in Istanbul is the shape of Russia's 22-year-old Artem Lukyanenko.
Lukyanenko has impressed this winter by setting personal bests in all seven of the heptathlon disciplines and taking the bronze medal in Istanbul behind Kasyanov. It was there that Lukyanenko confirmed to European Athletics that Helsinki is also very much in his plans and a focal point of the summer.
Into the bargain, potentially making the decathlon in Helsinki even more exiting and enthralling, The Netherlands' Eelco Sintnicolaas and Belarus' Andrey Kravchenko, the silver and bronze medallists behind Barras in Barcelona, are expected to be at the 2012 European Athletics Championships.
The 2012 European Athletics Championships will be held in Helsinki, Finland, from 27 June – 1 July.