The European Athletics Indoor Championships in Apeldoorn from 6-9 March is set to offer a brilliant heptathlon battle as Norway’s Sander Skotheim and Switzerland’s Simon Ehammer bid for their first senior European title.
They will be fighting against the continent’s reigning decathlon champion, Estonia’s Johannes Erm, with the seven disciplines taking place across the second and third days of the event on 7-8 March.
Skotheim is in the driving seat coming into Apeldoorn. He scored 6484 points to break the European heptathlon record and move to fifth on the world all-time list at the World Athletics Combined Events Tour Silver meeting in Tallinn last month.
The 22-year-old has come second in five different international competitions over the past four years. That ranges from European Athletics U20 and U23 Championships, to senior level both indoors and outdoors.
A disappointing pole vault performance was a key reason why Erm pipped him at the 2024 European Athletics Championships in Rome last summer, while he was also the runner-up behind Ehammer at last year’s World Athletics Indoor Championships in Glasgow.
The Swiss athlete has had cruel luck at the European Athletics Indoor Championships, failing to finish the heptathlon at both of the Torun 2021 and Istanbul 2023 editions. However, he scored 6205 points at the X-Athletics combined events meeting in Aubiere in January, which is his sixth best performance behind the 6418 achieved in Glasgow.
Erm has had a low-key indoor season, although he did set a personal best of 7.99 in the 60m hurdles at last weekend’s Estonian Indoor Championships.
As ever, Ehammer should fly through the first two events. His 6.72 and 8.45m lifetime bests over the 60m and long jump are worth a combined 2162 points, compared to 1996 and 1974 points for the respective bests of Skotheim and Erm.
The onus would then be on Skotheim to maximise his 2.20m high jump, which is worth 992 points, over 100 more than the 2.08m best of both of his rivals.
Ehammer could come roaring back in the 60m hurdles, but he is 10 seconds slower than Erm, and 13 seconds slower than Skotheim over 1000m. That difference is worth 145 points in the Norwegian’s favour.
The other entrants do not quite have the same international pedigree as the aforementioned trio, but Luc Brewin pushed Ehammer hard in Aubiere, leading to a personal best of 6199 points.
He leads the French selection with defending champion and decathlon world record-holder Kevin Mayer absent, while Germany’s contingent is fronted by Till Steinforth, who improved his heptathlon score to 6255 points in Lincoln, Nebraska last month.
Just to make an Estonian team for an event like this is a challenge. Risto Lillemets was third in Istanbul two years ago while the triumvirate is completed by Rasmus Roosleht who replaces world decathlon fourth-placer Karel Tilga who’s pulled out of the championships with illness.
Both will know that a strong showing will do no harm to their hopes of future international selections.
Vanninen to resume rivarly against home favourite Dokter
Finland’s Saga Vanninen comes in as the narrow favourite for the final day pentathlon, having smashed her own national record with a score of 4843 points in Tallinn.
That is 166 more than the tally that took her to silver behind Belgium’s Noor Vidts at last year’s World Athletics Indoor Championships in Glasgow.
A long jump best of 6.48m was a highlight, before she impressively lowered her 800m personal best to 2:11.70 on a short track, when it had been 2:14.36 outright and 2:20.54 indoors.
As a result, if Vanninen - who is now coached by 2000 Olympic decathlon champion Erki Nool - can get anywhere near close to her remarkable 16.12m shot put, then the high jump is the only area in which other major contenders could realistically make up serious ground.
The Netherlands’ Sofie Dokter was second behind the Finn at both the 2021 European Athletics U20 Championships as well as 2023 European U23 Athletics Championships. Vanninen also finished ahead of Dokter at the 2024 World Athletics Indoor Championships with the Finn taking silver to her Dutch rival’s bronze.
But whereas the latter event was in Espoo on Vanninen’s home soil, the tables are turned in Apeldoorn, giving Dokter the chance to beat her long-term rival - and emulate Anouk Vetter, who won European heptathlon gold at Amsterdam 2016, the last main continental championship to be held in the Netherlands.
Dokter may also have an advantage over fellow Dutchwoman Emma Oosterwegel, as the 2020 Olympic bronze medallist is often aided by her incredible 56.66m javelin best to make up ground outdoors.
The same could be said of Kate O’Connor’s javelin throw, but the Irishwoman was second behind Vanninen in Tallinn, with a national record of 4683 points. She has also improved in all pentathlon disciplines apart from the shot put this year.
This year’s entries lean more towards strength-based rather than speed-based athletes like the absent Vidts, who you might expect to start and finish the event the strongest.
That said, Italy’s Sveva Gerevini made significant improvement in 2024, breaking her country’s pentathlon and heptathlon records, and she should be counted as a medal contender.
The 28-year-old improved her outdoor bests in five out of seven disciplines on her way to sixth at the European Athletics Championships in Rome, following her fourth place at the World Athletics Indoor Championships.
There are also some athletes with less quantifiable recent pentathlon form who cannot be discounted, especially in this wide-open and competitive field.
Great Britain’s Jade O’Dowda has a comparatively modest lifetime best of 4262 points, but she hasn’t competed in a pentathlon since 2021. In that time, she has improved her heptathlon best by nearly 300 points which means her pentathlon score is due to a significant revision.
Similarly, Austria’s Verena Mayr has a personal best of 4637 points, but it dates back to the 2019 edition of these championships in Glasgow, the same year she took home a bronze medal in the heptathlon at the World Athletics Championships in Doha.
Alex Seftel for European Athletics