Nils Schumann, German runner
Nils Schumann (German pronunciation: [niːls ˈʃuːman] (listen); born 20 May 1978) is a former German athlete, winner of the 800 m at the 2000 Summer Olympics, who retired in 2009. For most of the five years before his retirement he had featured sparingly at an international level due to injuries.
Schumann, born in Bad Frankenhausen, began his career as a footballer in 1984 before switching to athletics. He won a gold medal over 800 m at the 1998 European Athletics Indoor Championships in Valencia. At the European Championships in Budapest in the same year, he won the title in a close finish. A few weeks later he also won the 800 m race at the World Cup in Johannesburg.
He also made the final of the 1999 World Athletics Championships, but placed 8th and last. He had a quiet 2000 season, until the Olympics started in Sydney. Schumann cruised through the preliminaries, easily qualifying for the final. In the final, Schumann set in his final sprint at the last straight, taking the lead with just 50 m to go. Favourite Wilson Kipketer of Denmark gained in the closing meters, but was unable to prevent a surprise victory by the German runner. In the following year, Schumann finished in fifth place at the 2001 World Championships in Athletics in Edmonton.
Schumann, who also won a bronze medal at the 2002 European Championships, was unable to defend his Olympic title at the 2004 Summer Olympics in Athens, suffering from injury throughout the 2004 season.
1978May, 20
Nils Schumann
Choose Another Date
Events on 1978
- 11Feb
Aristotle
Censorship: China lifts a ban on works by Aristotle, William Shakespeare and Charles Dickens. - 27Apr
Watergate scandal
Former United States President Nixon aide John D. Ehrlichman is released from an Arizona prison after serving 18 months for Watergate-related crimes. - 25Jul
In vitro fertilisation
Birth of Louise Joy Brown, the first human to have been born after conception by in vitro fertilisation, or IVF. - 22Oct
Pope John Paul II
Papal inauguration of Pope John Paul II. - 18Nov
Jim Jones
In Jonestown, Guyana, Jim Jones led his Peoples Temple to a mass murder-suicide that claimed 918 lives in all, 909 of them in Jonestown itself, including over 270 children. Congressman Leo Ryan is murdered by members of the Peoples Temple hours earlier.