Xénia Siska
| Medal record | ||
|---|---|---|
| Women's athletics | ||
Representing  Hungary | ||
| IAAF World Indoor Games | ||
.svg.png){kind=icon} | 1985 Paris | 60 m hurdles |
Xénia Siska (born 3 November 1957) is a Hungarian track and field athlete who specialised in the 100 metres hurdles. She is her country's best ever female sprint hurdler, holding the Hungarian record in the 100 m hurdles (12.76 seconds), as well as the 60 metres hurdles and 50 metres hurdles. She is also a co-holder of the 4×100 metres relay national record.[1][2]
Her most significant achievement was a gold medal at the 1985 IAAF World Indoor Games in the 60 m hurdles event. She was a semi-finalist at the 1980 Moscow Olympics and the 1983 World Championships in Athletics. She was also twice a semi-finalist at the European Athletics Championships (1978 and 1986).
Career
Born in Budapest,[3] she won her first continental medal at the 1975 European Athletics Junior Championships at the age of seventeen, coming third in the 100 m hurdles.[4] She joined Vasas SC, a major sports club in Budapest.[3] In 1978 she won her first senior national titles at the Hungarian championships, winning the 60 metres hurdles indoor title then the 100 m hurdles title outdoors.[5][6] The 1978 European Athletics Championships was the venue of her major international debut and she reached the semi-final stage, running a time of 13.36 seconds.[7]
Siska defended her Hungarian 60 m hurdles title in 1979 – she would go undefeated in this competition until 1982.[5] This led to her selection for the 1979 European Athletics Indoor Championships and she was again a semi-finalist at continental level.[8] Outdoors, she was bested by pentathlete Margit Papp in the 100 m hurdles at the Hungarian Championships.[6] She returned to the top of the national scene in 1980 and ran a personal best time of 13.17 seconds, ranking in the top-25 hurdlers that year.[9] Her Olympic debut followed, as she was chosen to compete for Hungary at the 1980 Summer Olympics in Moscow. She did not reach the final, falling in the semi-final and failing to finish the race.[3]
She finally reached a senior final at the 1981 European Athletics Indoor Championships, where she placed sixth in the 50 metres hurdles after running a best of 6.89 seconds in the qualifiers.[8] After winning her fifth and final 60 m hurdles national title,[5] she was entered into the 1982 European Athletics Indoor Championships, but did not progress to the final.[8] She continued to improve as an athlete outdoors, winning the 1983 national title in a championship record time 13.20 seconds.[6] The inaugural 1983 World Championships in Athletics marked her second appearance on the global stage and she reached the semi-finals of the 100 m hurdles.[10]
Her breakthrough in the 100 m hurdles event came in 1984: at the age of 26 she set a Hungarian record of 12.76 seconds in Budapest. This time placed her eleventh on the global rankings for the season.[9] She won a national title in the 100 metres, though her winning time over twelve seconds was the slowest to win the event for over two decades.[6] With the Eastern Bloc nations boycotting the 1984 Los Angeles Olympics, she competed at the Friendship Games instead and place eighth.[11] For her performances she was selected as the female Hungarian Athlete of the Year by the national federation.[12] The greatest achievement of her career followed at the 1985 IAAF World Indoor Games. At the event (a precursor to the modern IAAF World Indoor Championships) she set a lifetime best of eight seconds flat for the 60 m hurdles in qualifying then went on to take the gold medal in the final.[13] Outdoors she had a season's best of 12.99 seconds, enough to place in the top twenty for the year.[9]
In 1986 she set the Hungarian Championships record at 12.92 seconds – a mark which remains undefeated.[6] She came close to her personal best in Budapest in August, running 12.77 seconds to finish eleventh on the world season's rankings.[9] The standard of competition was high at the 1986 European Athletics Championships; in spite of running 12.90 in the semi-finals, this was only enough for fifth in the race which was won by Yordanka Donkova, who broke the world record that year.[7] After the competition, Siska topped the podium at the Athletissima meeting in Lausanne with a run of 12.86 seconds.[8]
Her 1987 season was highlighted by a run of 12.77 seconds in Budapest, which placed her seventh in the world rankings for the season.[9] This marked the last time that she featured near the top of the rankings. In 1988 she won an eighth Hungarian 100 m hurdles – the last national title of her career.[6]
Personal bests
- 100 metres hurdles – 12.76 seconds (1984)
- 60 metres hurdles – 8.00 seconds (1985)
- 50 metres hurdles – 6.89 seconds (1981)
- 4×100 metres relay – 44.34 seconds (1982)
National titles
- 100 metres hurdles: 1978, 1980, 1981, 1982, 1983, 1984, 1986, 1988[6]
- 100 metres: 1984[6]
- 60 metres hurdles: 1978, 1979, 1980, 1981, 1982[5]
International competitions
| Year | Competition | Venue | Position | Event | Notes |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1975 | European Junior Championships | Athens, Greece | 3rd | 100 metres hurdles | |
| 1978 | European Championships | Prague, Czechoslovakia | 6th (semis) | 100 metres hurdles | |
| 1979 | European Indoor Championships | Vienna, Austria | 5th (semis) | 60 metres hurdles | |
| 1980 | Olympic Games | Moscow, Soviet Union | DNF (semis) | 100 metres hurdles | |
| 1981 | European Indoor Championships | Grenoble, France | 6th | 100 metres hurdles | |
| 1982 | European Indoor Championships | Milan, Italy | 6th (semis) | 60 metres hurdles | |
| 1983 | World Championships | Helsinki, Finland | 8th (semis) | 100 metres hurdles | |
| 1984 | Friendship Games | Prague, Czechoslovakia | 8th | 100 metres hurdles | |
| 1985 | IAAF World Indoor Games | Paris, France | 1st | 60 metres hurdles | |
| 1986 | European Championships | Stuttgart, West Germany | 5th (semis) | 100 metres hurdles |
References
- ↑ Magyar szabadtéri felnőtt női rekordok. Magyar Atlétikai Szövetség. Retrieved on 2014-10-19.
- ↑ Magyar fedett pályás felnőtt női rekordok. Magyar Atlétikai Szövetség. Retrieved on 2014-10-19.
- 1 2 3 Xenia Siska. Sports Reference. Retrieved on 2014-10-19.
- ↑ European Junior Championships 1975. World Junior Athletics History (archived). Retrieved on 2014-10-19.
- 1 2 3 4 Hungarian Indoor Championships. GBR Athletics. Retrieved on 2014-10-19.
- 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 Hungarian Championships. GBR Athletics. Retrieved on 2014-10-19.
- 1 2 European Athletics Championships Zürich 2014 - STATISTICS HANDBOOK. European Athletics Association, pp. 427-435. Retrieved on 2014-10-19.
- 1 2 3 4 Xenia Siska. Tilastopaja. Retrieved on 2014-10-19.
- 1 2 3 4 5 Xenia Siska. Track and Field Brinkster. Retrieved on 2014-10-19.
- ↑ Xenia Siska. IAAF. Retrieved on 2014-10-19.
- ↑ Henryk Sozański. Praga '84. "Lekkoatletyka", pp. 29-35. 1984.
- ↑ Antal Zoltán–Sass Tibor: A magyar sport kézikönyve. Az év sportolói (1958–1981), pp. 853–854. Sport Kiadó, Budapest, 1983. ISBN 963-253-562-6.
- ↑ World Indoor Championships. GBR Athletics. Retrieved on 2014-10-19.
External links
- Xénia Siska profile at IAAF
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