European Athletics Championships Barcelona 2010 set for record participation – European Athletics (EAA) – News

With over 1,500 athletes from 50 countries making up the preliminary entries, the 2010 European Athletics Championships in Barcelona are expected to be the biggest in the history of the championships. 

Barcelona 2010 is also set to be unique in that it will be the first time all 50 European Athletics Member Federations have entered teams for the biggest continental showpiece in athletics.

The final deadline for entering athletes is 18 July.

The previous record – 1,288 athletes from 48 countries – was achieved during the last edition of the event in Göteborg, Sweden, in 2006.

Russia tops the list of countries with the biggest delegation of athletes followed by Germany and Spain.

Monaco on the other hand will send the smallest team with only one athlete.

As per the preliminary entries, Poland has outnumbered traditional heavyweights Great Britain, France and Italy in terms of athlete participation.

An average of 33 athletes per country will compete in the Spanish city.

The number of participants in the Marathon races has also gone up compared to previous years. The two marathon races, which will be staged entirely in Barcelona's city centre, will have 54 athletes in the women's category (31 July at 10.05am) and 69 in the men's (1 August at 10.05am) making it the discipline with the highest number of participants.

On the other hand, just 17 athletes will start in the women's 10000m race and 27 in the men's 5000 and 3000m steeplechase.

The host nation will field athletes in all 47 disciplines.

For more informations on the 2010 European Athletics Championships in Barcelona please click here.

European Athletics (EAA) – News