Machine-translated from Faroese and not yet reviewed. Read the original.
On Saturday our 11 talents took part in 12 events. It is fair to say that in most cases they lived up to expectations, and in some cases did even better.
Dánjal Jákup Niclasen took everyone by surprise when, among 60 competitors, he managed to squeeze into the B final of the 100 metres for boys 15. His time in the heats, into a slight headwind, was 12.23 sec. Two hours later the finals were on the programme. And here Dánjal Jákup, with third place, managed to move a few more places up the list, so that he finished 11th overall. His time was 12.06, the best he has run with a legal wind. Sunday will now be exciting, when Dánjal Jákup runs the 300 m at 11:30.
In the 100 metres for boys 16 we had two participants, Trygvi Laksafoss and Rúni Seloy, who were both in the same heat. There was a headwind, so neither of them managed to get really close to their personal bests. Rúni finished 4th and Trygvi 7th in the heat. Their times were 12.50 and 12.80 seconds respectively. Overall, Rúni was just below the middle and Trygvi a little further back of the 61 sprinters.
Just an hour later Trygvi began his main event, the high jump. To put it mildly, Trygvi came flying onto the talent squad this spring, when he first jumped 1.66 and then 1.70 m in his next competition. The Faroese record in the high jump is 1.75 m, so it was exciting to see whether Trygvi was already starting to get a sniff of the record. Trygvi’s coach is Heri Ziska, who hoped that Trygvi could once again clear 1.70 m. But despite some quite good attempts at that height, he did not get over, so Trygvi’s result was 1.65 m, which was good enough for 13th place out of the 22 participants. Most went out at 1.65 and 1.70 m, so it is not inconceivable that Trygvi would have been considerably higher up the list had he not been so new to the event. On the other hand, the possibilities and the future lie straight ahead.
There were many races in the 100 metres today. In the girls 14 category, 109 girls were entered, among them our Elsa Berg. Yesterday Elsa set a personal best in the 800 metres, and another one was lurking today. But here too it turned out that a slight headwind makes a big difference when you are talking about 1/100 of a second. With a result of 14.68 seconds, Elsa ended up just short of her personal best. Tomorrow Elsa runs the 300 metres, which is the distance she is focusing on most.
Sára Debesardóttir, who withdrew from the 600 metres yesterday because of injury, also had to withdraw from the 80 m today. The plan, however, is to look after her well enough that she will be ready for the 200 m on Sunday. Hopefully this works out, so that she gets at least one race on the trip after all.
Marita K. Petersen also competed in her best event. It was not until this spring that Marita really showed what a great natural talent she has with the javelin. With an entry distance of just under 25 metres, Marita was likely to finish near the top; indeed, Heri Ziska thought it not impossible that she could make the final, where the top 8 get three more attempts. But if you are going to be unlucky, you might as well be really unlucky. In her second attempt Marita threw close to her best ever, with 24.56 m. And that was exactly what the number 8 also threw. Unfortunately, the next-best throw was now decisive for which of them went through to the final, and here Marita drew the short straw. Marita still has so little competition experience that her 9th place is an excellent result, which really suggests that before too long we will have a super female javelin thrower.
Javelin thrower Helgi Geyti competed in the shot put. On Friday morning Helgi was a little disappointed with his javelin result, so he was now hoping to make amends by going beyond 11 metres for the first time. Helgi’s previous best throw was 10.90 metres. And Helgi got his redemption. With a throw of 11.12 metres he set a new personal best and an age-group record!
The biggest achievement of the day belonged to Bjørk Herup Olsen. For the second day in a row she set a new Faroese record – on Friday in the 3,000 metres and now in the 1,500 m. Conditions were otherwise not the best in the scorching sun down in the bowl of Nya Ullevi. But once the race was under way, Bjørk no longer thought about the heat. Now it was all about winning a medal in the girls 19 race. It turned into a very exciting race. With 1000 metres gone, an English girl and a Norwegian girl looked set to pull away, while Bjørk fought to catch them. She managed to close the gap, and with 300 metres to go she tried a long sprint. She went past them and held the lead into the final 100 metres. Here all three battled towards the finish, but the other two were a touch quicker. Over the last 10 metres Bjørk was giving so much that she almost fell over the line, as she seemed to lose her footing. But she was delighted when it was confirmed that she had both won bronze and set a Faroese record with a time of 4:37.83 min. The old record was 4:44.
In the 800 m for boys 15 we had two participants. Marnar Djurhuus was in the heat with the best runners. It was an even, hard and exciting race. Seven boys finished within two seconds of each other, and Marnar was right in the thick of it. In the end Marnar finished 9th with a new personal best. Marnar has not even been running for a year, yet already at 15 years of age he runs 2:04.51. That is almost unheard of!
Regin Joensen ran in another heat of the same race. Here too the pace was unusually fast – indeed much faster than the entry times suggested. So the pace did not suit Regin at all, although he still hung on in the pack for the first 500 metres. But he had put so much into it that the final part of the race went wrong. Regin, who ran 2:11 at the Tårby Games, now crossed the line in 2:18.96. Fortunately for Regin, he has a race over 2,000 metres on Sunday in which to let off steam. That distance is also better suited to Regin. Marnar Djurhuus will also take part in that race, and has the second-best entry time going in. So it will be a very exciting race.
Our last event of the day was Rebekka Fuglø (girls 17), who ran the 400 metres. Rebekka has not been running at her best lately. Injuries and pain have hampered her training for a long time now, so it has been hard to get into the super form we remember Rebekka best for. But today’s target of 64 seconds was achieved with a good effort.
