Discus thrower Richter narrowly misses German age-old record

Discus thrower Steven Richter has missed the almost 40-year-old German record by just eight centimeters. The 23-year-old threw the discus to exactly 74.00 meters in Ramona in the US state of Oklahoma and moved up to fourth place in the all-time world best list.

The national record is still held by Jürgen Schult, who threw the discus 74.08 meters in Neubrandenburg on 6 June 1986. For a long time, this was also the world record, which was only broken two years ago by Mykolas Alekna from Lithuania with a distance of 75.56 meters, also in Ramona.

Distances on sailing meadow controversial

Thanks to the wind, the conditions there are particularly favourable on a so-called sailing meadow, which is why the distances are also controversial. "I am very grateful for the competition, but I also know how to classify it correctly," Richter wrote on Instagram. "Now it's time to learn to throw far in a stadium," he added.

The athlete from LV 90 Erzgebirge threw 73.96 meters with his second-best attempt. He improved on his best distance set at the same venue by four and a half meters, but was still beaten by Australian Matt Denny. The Olympic bronze medalist won with 74.04 meters.