Sarah Lagger, Yanis David and Bence Halasz proudly took their place at the top of the podium as European athletics hailed another day of gold success at the IAAF World Under-20 Championships in Bydgoszcz.
A week after finishing second in the heptathlon at the European Youth Championships in Tbilisi, Austrian Lagger is now champion of the world - and she is still only 16.
'I cannot believe it, it is special for me,' said beaming Lagger, after overcoming a 181-points difference from the first day to break the national record with 5960 from Cuba’s overnight leader Adriana Rodriguez (5925) and Belgian Hanne Maudens (5881).
The top six all achieved a personal best, with Sweden’s Bianca Salming (5840) in fourth and teammate Lovisa Ostervall (5723) in fifth.
Lagger had first-day pbs in the 100m hurdles (14.25) and shot put (13.09m) but she was still left with a big task with Rodriguez in charge.
The second day began with the long jump - and Lagger had an even bigger gap to close as Rodriguez reached 5.96m, one centimetre more than the Austrian, bringing her 837 points to 834.
But it all changed with the javelin as the morning programme was coming to an end.
Lagger was in Group A and in the second round, she threw 43.65m, a personal best which brought 737 points while in Group B, Rodriguez’s best was 37.36m, for 617.
The Cuban still led, with 5145, but now Lagger was now just 64 points behind her with Maudens in third (4998) and a thrilling 800m awaited.
Lagger never panicked and proved strong enough, finishing second in the race in 2:15.99 - as Maudens won in 2:15.70 - with Rodriguez back in fifth, almost eight seconds behind the Austrian in a pb of 2:23.27.
Gold was Lagger’s, winning her country’s first medal in Bydgoszcz, by just 35 points and she then revealed her next aim was the 2017 European Athletics Under-20 Championships in Grosseto in exactly 12 months time.
The opening round of the women’s long jump decided gold and silver as European athletes made the top three.
French star David, 18, put the seal on the title with a superb 6.42m for victory from Germany’s Sophie Weissenberg (6.40m) with another Frenchwoman, Hilary Kpatcha, jumping a second-round personal best of 6.33m for bronze.
David really put everything into that opening leap in the final, with 6.29m in the next round followed by two fouls, and now she will be seeking a second gold today in the triple jump after what proved a busy Friday for the 2014 Youth Olympic champion.
She had warmed-up for her long jump final in the evening by qualifying for the triple final with 13.18m in the morning.
A year on from winning gold in the hammer at the European Athletics Junior Championships in Eskilstuna, Hungary’s Halasz, 18, snatched the title with a brilliant third-round throw here in Poland to deny Hlib Piskunov.
The Ukrainian had led with a personal best of 79.58m from the second round in a competition where Halasz had started with 73.12m and then added 78.74m. But with his third effort, he broke 80 metres, throwing 80.93m, and in that moment, the title was his, with Finland’s Aleksi Jaakkola winning bronze with 77.88m.