Adva Cohen is through to the final of the women's 3,000m steeplechase at the European Athletics Championships in Birmingham after grinding out eighth place in a tense qualifying heat at Alexander Stadium, ONE reported.
It was not a straightforward passage. Cohen went out fast, sitting in fourth for the early laps, before a poor landing at a water jump cost her momentum and dropped her back to seventh. She fought to stay in touch through the closing stages and crossed the line eighth, in 9:37.15, enough to advance.
The result keeps alive Cohen's hopes of a strong finish at a championship where she arrives as Israel's national record holder in the event. Her personal best of 9:19.90, set at last year's World Championships in Tokyo, remains well clear of Monday's heat time and shows she has faster in her legs for the final.
Cohen, 30, has built a habit of showing up on the European stage. Her breakthrough came in Berlin in 2018, where she stunned the field to finish fifth in the final — still the best Israeli result in the event at a European Championships. Two years ago in Rome she also reached the final, finishing 12th, according to World Athletics records.
Born in Jerusalem, Cohen first made her name on the American collegiate circuit — winning national junior college titles before continuing at the University of New Mexico — and has since developed into one of Israel's most consistent international distance runners.
Making a European final is no small feat in a discipline as physically punishing as the steeplechase, where a single bad water jump, like the one that briefly derailed Cohen on Monday, can end a race in an instant.
Israel's team in Birmingham will now be watching to see whether Cohen can build on Monday's scrap and push toward the front of the field when the final is run later in the championships.
