[Athlétisme] Van der Weeks prends his marks

REGIO MEETING 2, SUNDAY AT THE HULL The sportswoman of the year returned home.

After an excellent year 2023 and a 2024 vintage that will be remembered, it was time to go back to school for Patrizia Van der Weken.

Last year, she started her season at home, during the Regio Meeting 3. A simple formality with two races completed in 7« 21 in series, which allowed him to equal his national record which dated two years previously before slamming 7« 17 in the final to improve his career best mark for the first time. A time that she would lower again two weeks later, during a CMCM where she took the best world performance of the year at that time with a 7« 09 which will remain 11^e best of the year and third at continental level.

Subsequently, she would confirm by reaching the world indoor final before a summer season where she would further push the limits of Luxembourg female athletes (4^e at the European Championships, Diamond League finalist and Olympic semi-finalist).

After a few weeks of well-deserved rest, she went back to work. A training course in Tenerife, another in South Africa and this Sunday, the first test during the Regio Meeting 2. A start without real opposition for the 25-year-old young woman: “I’m not expecting anything special. I just want to see where I fit in,” she confided a few days ago in our columns.

Sunday at around 2:40 p.m., she was at the start of the first series of the 60m. A straight line swallowed in 7« 19, faster than his old national record which had held for two years. And less than two hours later, she was at the start of the final. With a race substantially identical to the previous one. And an equivalent time: 7« 20.

“I want to be regular around 7« 15-7« 20,” she said again when looking ahead to this winter season. We can say that, for this first outing, it did the job. No more.

She did not seem satisfied with her performance. While his long-time coach, Arnaud Starck, seemed rather mixed: “It was just to take stock of a complete race. See what needs to be worked on, what worked, what didn’t work.”

He is rather satisfied with the time: “It is still quite good considering his feelings. Now, it’s clear that there is still work to do. In both races, it sags a little on its first support at the start and the end of the race is not great.

Objective: perform in March

Clearly, there is room to do better. And why not from its next release, during the CMCM. Even if the approach is different from that of last year: “Last year, she had her best time at the CMCM, in mid-January. Subsequently, things were less good in February and she returned to the world championships with good times. And this year, we don’t want to rebuild the same thing. We will make sure to be good in March (Editor’s note: at the time of the European Championships in Apeldoorn then the World Championships in Nanjing). So considering all that, it was still good. Afterwards, everything has to fall into place. It’s going to take a little time.”

We will have understood, the goal is to be efficient in March. But knowing the character of the double Luxembourg sportswoman of the year, we suspect that she will already want to go much faster against much stronger competition in two weeks, on the CMCM, which is now in the silver category.

Note that for her return from maternity leave, Anaïs Bauer won the B final in 8« 02.

Among the other results, we can highlight the new best national U18 performance of Zoe Hoffmann, who lowered her mark by 4 hundredths in the 60m hurdles series to bring it to 8« 73, before winning in 8« 78 in the final.