The 110m hurdles event, just like the whole Zagreb Meeting, was named after Boris Hanžeković, the best Croatian athlete before WWII, who was killed during an escape attempt from the Jasenovac concentration camp in 1945.
Boris Hanžeković peaked at the 1938 Balkan Games in Belgrade. He was not even 22 years old then and he managed to win the 110m hurdles showdown against Greece’s Christos Mantikas, the 1936 Berlin Olympics finalist and then the best athlete of the Balkans.
The 110m hurdles event has been called the Boris Hanžeković Memorial Race since 1952, when it was the second edition of the club showdown between Mladost and Dinamo. In 1957, it became a national meeting and in 1962 an international one. The first 110m hurdles race was won by Dinamo’s hurdler Petar Grgin, after which Ervin Srp of Mladost won twice in a row.
The Meeting organizers have always paid special attention to the 110m hurdles event. This is why seven winners of the Boris Hanžeković Memorial Race were Olympic champions and nine were world champions. Some of the world’s best hurdlers will come to Zagreb this year, as well.
Main competitors in the race for the Hanžeković family trophy will be number 3 in this year’s world rankings, France’s Wilhem Belocian (13.18), and USA’s Freddie Crittenden (13.30) ranked sixth. Asian vice-champion Yaqoub Mohamed Al Youha of Kuwait will also share the field with them.
The 70th, anniversary edition of the Hanžeković Memorial, a WA Continental Tour Gold series meeting, will take place in Zagreb’s Mladost Stadium on 15 September 2020. (M. Šarec/Press)