The European Athletics Championships have provided contrasting experiences for Dina Asher-Smith, and she is hoping Roma 2024 will provide another golden memory.
“I’m really excited for both the Europeans and the Olympics this year. It goes without saying both the Europeans and Olympics are big markers on my calendar this year,” she says, talking on European Athletics Ignite podcast series.
The British sprinter won her first senior title in Amsterdam 2016, racing to 200m gold, a distance she went on to become world champion at in Doha in 2019.
Golden triple
At Berlin 2018, she enjoyed an almost faultless championships, racing away with 100m, 200m and 4x100m titles. But at Munich 2022, as an athlete with huge ambitions, she was disconsolate to come away with 200m silver and eighth-place in the 100m, pulling up with cramp in the final.
Then having returned from last year’s World Athletics Championships in Budapest empty handed, placing eighth in the 100m final and seventh in the 200m, Asher-Smith took the bold step of switching from her long-time coach John Blackie in London to Edrick Floreal in Austin, USA.
And if her early season form is anything to go by, it has revitalised the effervescent Brit, who has chalked up numerous victories and leads the 2024 European list over 200m with a 22.29 clocking. She has also demonstrated her range extends beyond 200m with a 51.2 relay leg in the 4x400m at the Texas Relays.
"I love Rome"
Looking to Roma 2024, she says: “It’s likely I’ll be just doing the 100m and the relay (4x100m). The last European Championships I did not have a good one. Long story. It’s done.
“So, I am really excited for these Europeans, I have big goals for myself, very big aspirations of what I want to run, especially when I run the 100m and how I want to run and how I want to win it.
“I love Rome, I love doing the Rome Diamond League. That stadium is beautiful with all the statues in the warm-up area. I think they just had it resurfaced, and the football stadium is so historic.
“Rome is a beautiful city anyway. Everybody is really excited that the Europeans are in Rome. It’s going to be great.”
"Being European Champion is not easy"
Twice an Olympian and six-times a World Athletics Championship participant, Asher-Smith is now a well-seasoned international athlete. But she has a special affection for the European Athletics Championships.
“It is one of our favourite championships because track and field is so popular and so loved in Europe,” she says.
“When you are inside the stadium at a European Championships, the atmosphere can feel very much like a World Championships, with the passion of the fans and the calibre of the performances. It’s tough. To be a European Champion is not easy.”
And she is eager to get back to her best after the disappointments of Munich 2022.
“I came off Eugene (2022 World Athletics Championships) running almost 10.7 and 21 in the semi and getting a global bronze,” she recalls.
“Then I had not a fab Munich. In hindsight, me and my team know why. I’m not going to go into the detail. At the time, living it and experiencing it didn’t really make sense for me because I was in like PB shape. End of story. Did not go the way I wanted it to, so this time I would like it to go the way I want it to.”
Limitless ambitions
It was all so different from Berlin 2018, where she won triple gold, two weeks after a disappointing run at the London Diamond League, where she placed fourth in the 200m in front of an expectant crowd.
“I remember coming into Berlin, I was a bit frustrated actually,” she looks back. “I knew I was in a great place. I think underperforming in London had really instilled in me the need to execute in the moment.
“As an athlete, most of the time, you know what shape you are in. You know what you are capable of. But that means absolutely nothing unless when the gun goes you do what you are meant to do. I was actually quite grateful it went like that. But I think having that little bee in my bonnet really made me focussed and locked in.”
And whilst she isn't setting any specific targets, she is not limiting her ambitions for this year and beyond. "For me...it's about challenging my own expectations and dreams and aspirations for myself. And really being limitless in what I see for myself," she summarises.
Chris Broadbent for European Athletics