“You’re not going to stop!”

“You’re not going to stop!”

Thierry Gueorgiou is pretty sure that this European Championships will be his last as an athlete. But his team-mates are not so sure!

The European Championships in Portugal, which also include the World Cup, started with the Middle distance qualification race. The race was organised close to the Atlantic Ocean, about 30 kilometres south of Lisbon. Gueorgiou ran very well. “It has been a very good training winter in Sweden. There has been almost no snow. The previous winter there was a lot of snow”, Thierry says.

The Frenchman wants to take back the Middle distance crown this year. He hasn’t won any title in that distance since the World Championships in France in 2011. There he won all he took part in – Middle, Long and Relay. “At these Championships I will just run the Middle and the Relay. I want to concentrate hard on the Middle and have a great end for my European Championships”, he says.

- This will be the last?

“Yes, I cannot really think I will be taking part again in two years’ time”.

“You said in Bulgaria at the European Championships four years ago that that was the last one. You will go on”, smiles Vincent Coupat, team-mate of Thierry. Thierry says he will decide after the end of the season whether or not he will train hard for one more year.

At the World Championships in Italy this summer the Middle distance is also his big goal, but it may be he will do one more individual distance. “I have a free place on the Long distance since I won last time, but a decision on taking part in that distance can be taken shortly before the Championships”, he says.