GALVE, Sweden – It's been quite a summer for Manhattan College's Lina Bengtson (Malmo, Sweden). A week after finishing fifth in both the shot put and discus at the Swedish National Championships, Bengtson won the gold medal in both events at the Swedish Junior Nationals over the weekend.
Bengtson easily won the shot put. She took the lead with a second-round toss of 13.77 meters (45 feet, 2¼ inches). That mark would've been enough to hold up for the victory, but Bengtson improved to 13.98 m (45'10½) on her fifth attempt. She then closed the competition by getting out to 14.03 m (46'0½), which was more than 30 centimeters ahead of second place.
The competition in the discus was much tighter. Bengtson was in fourth place after the first round before moving into second with a third-round effort of 46.03 m (151'0). She improved to 47.50 m (155'10) on her fifth attempt, but was still sitting in second place entering the final throw. In the final round, Heidi Schmidt got out to 48.77 m (160'0) to take over the lead. However, Bengtson responded with a new personal best of 49.20 m (161'5) to clinch her second gold medal of the meet.
Dennis Eriksson (Sundsvall, Sweden), meanwhile, contested the men's 110 meter hurdles and placed sixth in a time of 15.75 seconds.
Both Bengtson and Love Litzell (Ostersund, Sweden) have already achieved the qualifying standard for the 2015 European Under-23 Championships.
