New paths

Gogl-Walli: No European Championships indoors, only the World Championships!

400m record holder Susanne Gogl-Walli, Austria's most consistent runner in recent years, is taking a new path in the coming indoor season! According to current plans, the Linz native will skip the European Championships in Apeldoorn (March 6 to 9) and only compete at the World Championships in Nanjing/China (March 21 to 23).

She and coach Wolfi Adler decided on this season plan at the end of the very successful training camp in Tenerife. The background: Gogl-Walli had taken part in all of the athletics highlights over the past four years (with the exception of the 2022 World Indoor Championships, for which she did not qualify).

After an extremely tough Olympic year with the Games in Paris, the World Indoor Championships in Glasgow and the European Championships in Rome, she wanted to take a step back. That is why she is now planning "only" the national indoor championships and two or three international meetings in February, then skipping the European Championships "99 percent" (Wolfi Adler) and concentrating fully on the World Indoor Championships in Nanjing.

Susanne Gogl-Walli(Bild: Olaf Brockmann)

These World Championships were originally planned for 2020, but due to the pandemic, the title fights in China were postponed several times and will now finally be held in 2025. The European Championships and World Championships will therefore take place within three weeks next March. "Of course I could do both championships, but I don't have to," says Gogl-Walli, who is delighted with the new season schedule: "It's also something different."

Already qualified for China
The big advantage that helped her in her decision: At the "Weltklasse" meeting in Zurich on September 5, she had already qualified for the World Indoor Championships in Nanjing, located on the Yangtze River, with her ÖLV record of 50.60 seconds. World Athletics had set the standard for direct qualification at 51.00. Only Gogl-Walli from the ÖLV has so far secured a starting place for the World Indoor Championships.

Looking back on the series of successes and the mammoth program of the athlete from Linz over the past four years, it is understandable that she will miss out on a European Indoor Championships. She reached the semi-finals at the Olympic Games (2021, 2024), the World Championships (2022, 2023) and the European Championships in 2022. She also reached the final at the 2024 World Indoor Championships, the 2023 European Indoor Championships and even the 2024 European Outdoor Championships. She also improved Karoline Käfer's age-old records (outdoor 50.62/indoor 51.90) to 50.60 and 51.37 seconds respectively.

World Championships in Tokyo also very late
Another point in favor of her 2025 season planning: Not only will the indoor World Championships take place at a very late date, but the outdoor World Championships in Tokyo (September 13-21) will also be held unusually late. This leaves plenty of time after the indoor season to build up for the outdoor season. "But Wolfi has to plan that," smiles Gogl-Walli. But as we know, the coach has always managed this planning for her with pinpoint accuracy in recent years. The good news is that Gogl-Walli has already qualified for the World Championships in Tokyo.