Nils SCHUMANN

Nils Schumann had a very rapid rise to fame in the 800m event in international athletics, easily making the often awkward transition from talented junior to champion athlete in the senior ranks. His first major international competition was the 1996 World Junior Championships in Sydney, where he finished fifth in 1min 49.44sec. The following year he won the European Junior title at Ljubljava, Slovenia in July, and then improved his personal best to 1min 46.61sec at Leverkusen on 20 August. Schumann made a spectacular entrance to senior competition in 1998. On 1 March, while still a junior, he won the European Indoor title at Valencia in a time of 1min 47.02sec. However, that was only a prelude to his performance in the European Championships in Budapest on 23 August.

In Budapest, Schumann showed his much more experienced rivals in the preliminary rounds that he was a force to be reckoned with in the final. He recorded the fastest time in the heats of 1min 46.12sec, and also the fastest time in the semi-finals of 1min 47.28sec. Schumann's main opposition in the final was world record-holder, Wilson Kipketer of Denmark, who was returning from illness. Kipketer set a cracking pace in the final, leading the field through 200m in 23.90sec, and 400m in 49.92sec. Kipketer still held the lead at 600m, but faded coming off the final turn, just as Schumann was making his drive for the finish. The young German blitzed the field down the straight to win the gold medal (seen celebrating afterwards in photo above) in a personal best time of 1min 44.89sec. More honours came Schumann's way in the World Cup at Johannesburg in September that year, where he won the gold medal off a slow pace in 1min 48.66sec. (Ron Casey)

Following his victories in the 800m at the European Championships and the World Cup in 1998 at only twenty years of age, it was assumed that Nils Schumann would capture additional honours on the track in the following year. However, Schumann had a relatively quieter year in 1999, during which time he experimented at other distances besides his favoured 800m event. This included producing a personal best time at 400m of 46.62sec at Jena in early June, and a personal best at 1000m of 2min 17.44sec at Weimar on 27 June. Despite competing sparingly in the 800m, he did compete at the 1999 World Championships in Seville, where he finished eighth in 1min 46.79sec behind Wilson Kipketer of Denmark. On 3 September, he lowered his personal best to 1min 44.47sec when finishing 7th behind Kipketer at Brussels in the fastest race of the year.

Schumann made a good start to the year in 2000, finishing second on the indoor list with a best time of 1min 45.65sec. He raced sparingly during the European outdoor season, in order to preserve his form for the Sydney Olympic Games, held late in the year at the end of September. Schumann finished 6th in 1min 45.75sec at the Golden Gala meet in Rome on 30 June, and produced his fastest time of the year, 1min 44.87sec, at Dortmund on 8 July. However, in Sydney, the competitive spirit that had taken him to his European title victory in 1998 again asserted itself. Schumann easily won his semi-final on 23 September in a personal best time of 1min 44.22sec, and in the final, two days later, he ran the greatest race of his career, winning the Olympic gold medal from Kipketer in a time of 1min 45.08sec (see photo above Schumann (1887) and Kipketer (1542). (Ron Casey)

800m Endrunde {Männer}.

2002 Europameisterschaft