European Athletics (EAA) – News – Greene and Shobukhova voted European Athletes of the Month for October |

 European Athletics is pleased to announce that British hurdler David Greene and Russian marathon runner Liliya Shobukhova have been voted as the European Athletes of the Month for October.

European 400m hurdles champion Greene, competing for Wales, capped a fantastic year by taking the gold medal at the Commonwealth Games in Delhi clocking 48.52. Earlier in the year, at the European Athletics Championships in Barcelona, the 24-year-old destroyed the field with a European-leading time and personal best of 48.12. He followed it up with an even better 47.88 clocking at the IAAF Continental Cup in Split.

Greene's time was just 0.06 seconds short of Kris Akabusi's 18-year-old British record.

Shobukhova set a Russian marathon record in October and became the third fastest European women ever when she won the Chicago Marathon clocking 2:20.25, which was also the fastest time in the world this year.

The 32-year-old also won the London Marathon in April, in what was then a personal best of 2:22:00, and she has now won her last three outings over the classic distance after also winning in Chicago 12 months ago.

Portugal’s Hermano Ferreira, who produced the second best time by a European over the half marathon this year when clocking 61:24 to take the title at the European Champion Clubs Cup in Torres Vedras, was voted second in the men’s poll while Russia’s Aleksey V. Sokolov, who produced the third best time by a European in the marathon this year clocking 2:10:31 at the Dublin Marathon, came third.

The British duo of Louise Hazel and Jo Jackson finished second and third respectively in the women’s poll. Hazel took full advantage of the absence of world champion Jessica Ennis and produced a lifetime best score of 6156 points to take gold for England at the Commonwealth Games. She also set individual personal bests in the hurdles, 200 metres, long jump and javelin. Jackson produced a Games record of 1:34:22 to take the 20km walk gold for England in Delhi.

European Athletics’ monthly poll received overwhelming support from tens of thousands of athletics fans and media alike this month from all over Europe.

The European Athlete of the Month initiative was launched in January 2007 and is designed to recognise outstanding performers at all levels of the sport in Europe.

European Athletics names a male and female winner each month and features the athlete on the European Athletics website.

Selections are based on votes by the public, media and a panel of European Athletics experts – each counting for 33.3% of the final vote. No athlete who has previously served a two-year doping ban can be nominated for or win the European Athlete of the Month award.

2010 previous winners:

European Athletics (EAA) – News –