Norway’s “crazy” Viking athlete Karsten Warholm won another gold medal, this time at the European Championships in Berlin, when he crossed the finish line first in the men’s 400-meter hurdles race Thursday evening. After donning his customary Viking helmet, he was ready to sum up the race:
“It was tough, it cost incredibly much, and (Turkish athlete Yasmani) Copello pushed me the whole way,” Warholm told state broadcaster NRK. “But I was prepared. I was ready. Oh, I love moments like this!”
It took quite a while for both he and Copello, who won silver, to recover from the race, with Warholm beating his arch European rival with a time of 47.64 seconds. That set a new Norwegian record, and was even quicker than what he ran when he won the World Championship last year in London.
“Words can’t describe how I feel,” Warholm said, still wearing a Norwegian flag draped over his shoulders and the plastic Viking helmet on his head. “It’s not so long ago I was here at the Olympic Stadium (in Berlin) as a kid and thought, ‘this is just too much.'”
Sports commentators were full of enthusiasm. “What a run!” exclaimed NRK commentator Jann Post. “What a duel (between Warholm and Copello)!” Post noted how they were neck-and-neck right up to the last hurdle. He thinks the 22-year-old Warholm ran the race of his life, conveniently in the final at the European Championships.
He’s also scheduled to run a 400-meter race without hurdles on Friday. His happy coach Leif Olav Alnes advised him not to even think about that yet.
Copello, meanwhile, also seemed pleased with his performance, which set a new Turkish record. “It was a good run,” he told NRK. “It’s good to see that I can come so close to Karsten.”
newsinenglish.no/Nina Berglund
