Olympic and European 100m champion Marcell Jacobs gave a thrilling glimpse of what was to come at the Roma 2024 European Athletics Championships, which take place 7-12 June.
The Italian icon took part in the Roma Sprint Festival on Saturday (18) at the immaculately renovated Stadio dei Marmi, which will be the warm-up track for next month’s showpiece event.
And Jacobs did not let down the hordes of home fans who came to support their hero as he scorched to a season’s best of 10.07 (+1.1m/s) to win the 100m.
“The race went quite well but there were always some errors at the start. If I had started like in the warm-up there would have been another race. I still missed that part, but I’m happy with it.
“And then I’ve had some sort of allergy for two days. I finished the race unable to breathe, it took me a while to recover, but everything was fine. I’m very happy to have raced in this environment, the support from all the fans was incredible, I had a lot of fun.
“For us athletes, cheering is fundamental, the more they support us, the more we are able to bring out the best in ourselves. Now we are all looking forward to the European Championships in the Olympic Stadium,” said Jacobs.
In addition to Jacobs‘ success at the all-marble arena, the crowd were treated to some brilliant 200m victories by European bronze medallist Filippo Tortu, who won the men’s race in 20.72 (+0.7m/s) and Zaynab Dosso, the World Indoor 60m bronze medallist who set a personal best of 23.10 (0.4m/s).
Credit photo: Grana\FIDAL
