Antigoni Drismpioti performed another miracle at the European Championships in Munich: she took her second gold medal after finishing first in the 20 km walk on Saturday morning.
Really amazing! 🇬🇷Antigoni #Ntrismpioti won her second 🥇gold medal at #Munich2022. She is both the 20km and 35km Race Walk European Champion 2022!
Congulations Antigoni! 👏👏 pic.twitter.com/3AH4G3CCjw
— Greek News Agenda (@greeknewsagenda) August 20, 2022
With a time of 1:29:03, Drysmpioti broke her personal best. She started the race relatively slowly and accelerated after the 11th kilometer.
It’s Greece’s gold! 🇬🇷
Antigoni Ntrismpioti triumphs in the first ever staging of the 35km race walk in #Munich2022! 🥇 #BackToTheRoofs pic.twitter.com/z23LMZCfVs
— European Athletics (@EuroAthletics) August 16, 2022
Last Wednesday, 38-year-old Drismpioti won gold in the 35 km run. The athlete from Karditsa, in northern Greece, is welcomed by the country’s sports authorities and officials as “Golden Girl of Greece” Ohowever, she fought incredibly long and hard to achieve her goal, often against all odds.
After the Tokyo Olympics, the National Olympic Committee excluded her from sponsorship and other training benefits due to her age. But she didn’t give up. She had to take a break and refrain from competing in order to work and financially help her family. Working long shifts at the family tavern, she trained either early in the morning or after work. According to local media, at some point it was the mayor who bought her two pairs of athletic shoes.
PS It’s always like this in Greece: winning athletes are greeted and every official rushes to take the opportunity to take a photo and they are forgotten if they don’t. How many gold medalists have said they’ve trained in the fields, on makeshift training tracks, in appalling conditions – and that’s in the country that hosted the 2004 Olympics.
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