When in Rome, do as Rhasidat Adeleke does.
Because if the sole purpose of Sunday night’s exercise was to book her place in the European Championship 400 metres final, then Adeleke did exactly that with her now trademark elegance and increasingly familiar winning style.
Drawn in the first of three semi-finals, only the top two sure of progressing to Monday’s medal showdown (8.50pm Irish time), Adeleke absolutely coasted around one lap of the Stadio Olimpico before nailing the win in 50.54 seconds – a season best, naturally, given it was her first individual 400m of the year, and marginally the fastest among the eight final qualifiers.
Adeleke’s Irish record is 49.20 seconds set in Texas this time last year, the sort of sub-50 clocking the 21-year-old Dublin sprinter will be looking towards next if she is to strike another gold to add to that still glittering one struck in the mixed 4x400m relay on Friday night.
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Here, the 21-year-old Dublin sprinter was unquestionably running well within herself, the outside lane eight much to her liking too as Britain’s Laviai Nielson briefly hit the front coming into the home stretch in lane five, before finishing second in 50.73, also a season best for her.
That Irish medal challenge will suitably be a sort of team effort, given Sharlene Mawdsley, also part of that gold-medal winning relay quartet, then booked her place in the final too, the 26-year-old from Tipperary finishing second in her semi-final behind the big Dutch threat, Lieke Klaver.
Klaver, a training partner of defending champion Femke Bol, who this time is focusing individually on the 400m hurdles final, won that semi-final in a similarly cool and impressive 50.57 seconds, ahead of Mawdsley’s 50.99, the second fastest time of her life after the 50.72 she clocked last month.
Two years ago, a then 19-year-old Adeleke finished fifth in this final in Munich, running in lane one, and with a more favourable outside lane this time, now finds herself the gold medal favourite. It has all the markings of a thrilling race.
“I felt good, the legs feel in a good place, and it was just important to keep my head down, and really excited to see where it goes from here.” said Adeleke, cool as ever. “It was kind of hard to come down from the high of the last few days, because winning a major medal is so exciting, and everybody was actually buzzing.
“One of the things I look forward too as well is coming out and looking out for the Irish fans, it gives me great inspiration. But I just wanted to make sure of my place in the final, not waste too much energy. I was looking up at the screen coming into the straight, knew I was in a good spot. And good to be out in the stadium again, it was a good run. So we’ll see.”
There is, however, another big medal threat too in Natalia Kaczmarek from Poland, who finished second behind Bol in Munich last time out. She won the second semi-final here in 50.70 seconds, Sophie Becker finishing fourth in that race in 51.54, the 10th fastest overall time on the night, and another progressive run from the 27-year-old from Wexford.
The always fast-finishing Kaczmarek stepped up to world silver last year in Budapest last summer behind Marileidy Paulino of the Dominican Republic, when Adeleke finished fourth. She has already run a season’s best of 49.80, set in Oslo 12 days ago, with a personal best of 49.48.
For Mawdsley, starting the third semi-final also in lane eight, the plan was clearly to stay as close as possible to Klaver, in the lane inside her, and she too appears to have a little more in reserve.
“Top two, automatic qualification, that’s the job done,” said Mawdsley, who clocked that stunning 49.40-second split in the mixed relay, and now finds herself in a first senior championship final as an individual after being controversially disqualified after making the World Indoor final in Glasgow earlier this year.
“I was a little nervous today, and to go sub-51 again I’m really happy, so hopefully will feel a bit more relaxed for the final now and see what I can do. It’s my first major final individually as well.”
For Monday’s final, Mawdsley has been drawn in lane four, with Adeleke in lane six.
Later in the night, Chris O’Donnell, who ran the opening leg of the mixed relay, also went looking for his place in the men’s 400m final. And while he wasn’t far off originally, finishing fourth in 45.72 seconds, he was then disqualified for a lane infringement.
“All I can think is maybe a foot on the line, something like that, no big deal,” said O’Donnell, his 45.72 just shy of the 45.69 season best he ran in qualifying on Saturday morning.
“But that’s still three solid runs this week. It’s been a big step forward from my last championships. I was competitive again tonight, and happy with how I coped with back to back runs.”
O’Donnell’s semi-final was won by Alexander Doom from Belgium, the World Indoor champion, in 44.87 seconds. The 21-year-old Italian Luca Sito again displayed remarkable composure to win the first semi-final in 44.75 seconds, a lifetime best, putting himself in line to possibly win another gold medal for Italy, their gold medal tally already up to seven.
