The 1981 European Cup was the 8th edition of the European Cup of athletics.^[1] It was the last edition to feature multiple stages of competition before being replaced by the promotion/relegation system since 1983.

The "A" Finals were held in Zagreb, Yugoslavia. The first two teams qualified for the 1981 IAAF World Cup.

"A" Final

Held in Zagreb on 15 and 16 August.^[2]

Team standings

Men

Pos.	Nation	Points
1	East Germany	128
2	Soviet Union	124.5
3	Great Britain	106.5
4	West Germany	97
5	Italy	75
6	Poland	74
7	France	71
8	Yugoslavia	41

Women

Pos.	Nation	Points
1	East Germany	108.5
2	Soviet Union	97
3	West Germany	74
	Great Britain	74
5	Bulgaria	72
6	Poland	53.5
7	Hungary	41
8	Yugoslavia	20

Results summary

Men's events

Event	Gold		Silver		Bronze
100 m (Wind: -0.9 m/s)	Allan Wells  Great Britain	10.17	Frank Emmelmann  East Germany	10.21	Hermann Panzo  France	10.29
200 m (Wind: +0.3 m/s)	Frank Emmelmann  East Germany	20.33 CR	Allan Wells  Great Britain	20.35	Patrick Barré  France	20.60
400 m	Hartmut Weber  West Germany	45.32	Mauro Zuliani  Italy	45.35	Andreas Knebel  East Germany	45.76
800 m	Sebastian Coe  Great Britain	1:47.03	Willi Wülbeck  West Germany	1:47.72	Olaf Beyer  East Germany	1:47.73
1500 m	Olaf Beyer  East Germany	3:43.52	Nikolay Kirov  Soviet Union	3:43.68	Steve Cram  Great Britain	3:43.72
5000 m	Dave Moorcroft  Great Britain	13:43.18	Valeriy Abramov  Soviet Union	13:43.69	Hansjörg Kunze  East Germany	13:43.72
10,000 m	Werner Schildhauer  East Germany	28:45.89	Julian Goater  Great Britain	28:55.04	Karl Fleschen  West Germany	28:57.74
3000 m steeplechase	Mariano Scartezzini  Italy	8:13.32 CR	Bogusław Mamiński  Poland	8:17.23	Patriz Ilg  West Germany	8:21.13
110 m hurdles (Wind: -0.6 m/s)	Mark Holtom  Great Britain	13.79	Andreas Schlisske  East Germany	13.85	Romuald Giegiel  Poland	13.88
400 m hurdles	Volker Beck  East Germany	48.94	Harald Schmid  West Germany	49.12	Dmitriy Shkarupin  Soviet Union	49.71
4 × 100 m	Poland Krzysztof Zwoliński Zenon Licznerski Leszek Dunecki Marian Woronin	38.66	Soviet Union Andrey Shlyapnikov Nikolay Sidorov Aleksandr Aksinin Vladimir Muravyov	38.80	France Philippe Le Joncour Bernard Petibois Antoine Richard Hermann Panzo	38.83
4 × 400 m	Italy Stefano Malinverni Alfonso Di Guida Roberto Ribaud Mauro Zuliani	3:01.42	Soviet Union Pavel Roshchin Vitaliy Fedotov Viktor Burakov Viktor Markin	3:01.69	Great Britain Roy Dickens Harry Cook Steve Scout David Jenkins	3:02.93
High jump	Valeriy Sereda  Soviet Union	2.30	Gerd Nagel  West Germany	2.28	Massimo Di Giorgio  Italy	2.26
Pole vault	Jean-Michel Bellot  France Konstantin Volkov  Soviet Union	5.40			Keith Stock  Great Britain	5.30
Long jump	Uwe Lange  East Germany	7.98	Shamil Abbyasov  Soviet Union	7.93	Joachim Busse  West Germany	7.82w
Triple jump	Jaak Uudmäe  Soviet Union	16.97	Aston Moore  Great Britain	16.86	Miloš Srejović  Yugoslavia	16.54
Shot put	Udo Beyer  East Germany	21.41	Yevgeniy Mironov  Soviet Union	20.33	Ralf Reichenbach  West Germany	19.70
Discus throw	Armin Lemme  East Germany	64.06	Dmitriy Kovtsun  Soviet Union	59.60	Alwin Wagner  West Germany	59.16
Hammer throw	Yuriy Sedykh  Soviet Union	77.68	Karl-Hans Riehm  West Germany	75.86	Roland Steuk  East Germany	73.34
Javelin throw	Detlef Michel  East Germany	90.86 CR	Dainis Kûla  Soviet Union	88.40	Michał Wacławik  Poland	88.26
WR world record | AR area record | CR championship record | GR games record | NR national record | OR Olympic record | PB personal best | SB season best | WL world leading (in a given season)

Women's events

Event	Gold		Silver		Bronze
100 m (Wind: -1.0 m/s)	Marlies Göhr  East Germany	11.17	Kathy Smallwood  Great Britain	11.27	Olga Zolotaryova  Soviet Union	11.36
200 m (Wind: -1.6 m/s)	Bärbel Wöckel  East Germany	22.19	Kathy Smallwood  Great Britain	22.65	Natalya Bochina  Soviet Union	23.08
400 m	Marita Koch  East Germany	49.43	Gaby Bussmann  West Germany	50.83	Irina Nazarova  Soviet Union	51.31
800 m	Martina Steuk  East Germany	1:57.16	Lyudmila Veselkova  Soviet Union	1:57.25	Jolanta Januchta  Poland	1:58.50
1500 m	Tamara Sorokina  Soviet Union	4:01.37 CR	Ulrike Bruns  East Germany	4:02.21	Anna Bukis  Poland	4:04.38
3000 m	Angelika Zauber  East Germany	8:49.61 CR	Yelena Sipatova  Soviet Union	8:49.99	Paula Fudge  Great Britain	8:54.59
100 m hurdles (Wind: -2.4 m/s)	Tatyana Anisimova  Soviet Union	12.91	Kerstin Knabe  East Germany	13.08	Lucyna Langer  Poland	13.20
400 m hurdles	Ellen Neumann  East Germany	54.90	Ana Kasteckaja  Soviet Union	56.34	Genowefa Błaszak  Poland	57.21
4 × 100 m	East Germany Annelies Walter Bärbel Wöckel Gesine Walther Marlies Göhr	42.53	Great Britain Wendy Hoyte Kathy Smallwood Beverley Goddard Shirley Thomas	43.03	Soviet Union Olga Zolotaryova Olga Nasonova Lyudmila Kondratyeva Natalya Bochina	43.26
4 × 400 m	East Germany Dagmar Rübsam Martina Steuk Bärbel Wöckel Marita Koch	3:19.83	Soviet Union Nadezhda Lyalina Tatyana Litvinova Irina Baskakova Irina Nazarova	3:24.85	Great Britain Linda Forsyth Michelle Scutt Verona Elder Joslyn Hoyte-Smith	3:27.27
High jump	Ulrike Meyfarth  East Germany	1.94	Lyudmila Zhecheva  Bulgaria	1.92	Yelena Popkova  Soviet Union	1.86
Long jump	Sigrid Ulbricht  East Germany	6.86	Anna Włodarczyk  Poland	6.66	Tatyana Kolpakova  Soviet Union	6.59
Shot put	Ilona Slupianek  East Germany	21.12	Verzhinia Veselinova  Bulgaria	20.77	Galina Isayeva  Soviet Union	18.15
Discus throw	Mariya Petkova  Bulgaria	69.08	Galina Savinkova  Soviet Union	68.46	Evelin Jahl  East Germany	67.32
Javelin throw	Antoaneta Todorova  Bulgaria	71.88 WR, CR	Tessa Sanderson  Great Britain	65.94	Ingrid Thyssen  West Germany	63.86
WR world record | AR area record | CR championship record | GR games record | NR national record | OR Olympic record | PB personal best | SB season best | WL world leading (in a given season)

"B" Final

The winners qualified for the "A" final.

Men Held on 1 and 2 August in Athens, Greece[2] Pos. Nation Points 1  France 85 2  Hungary 78.5 3  Czechoslovakia 73.5 4  Finland 70 5  Spain 62 6  Greece 48

Women Held on 2 August in Pescara, Italy[2] Pos. Nation Points 1  Poland 64.5 2  Czechoslovakia 60 3  Italy 57 4  Romania 55 5  Netherlands 46 6  Finland 32.5

Semifinals

Men

All semifinals were held on 4 and 5 July.^[2] First two teams qualified for the "A" final (plus Yugoslavia as the host). Places 3–4 (plus Greece as the host) qualified for the "B" final.

Semifinal 1 Held in Lille, France Pos. Nation Points 1  East Germany 143 2  Italy 125 3  France 109 4  Czechoslovakia 95.5 5  Belgium 80.5 6  Netherlands 63 7  Greece 57 8  Denmark 44

Semifinal 2 Held in Helsinki, Finland Pos. Nation Points 1  Great Britain 134 2  Soviet Union 128 3  Finland 115 4  Yugoslavia 88 5  Bulgaria 83 6  Sweden 75 7  Norway 64 8  Turkey 20

Semifinal 3 Held in Warsaw, Poland Pos. Nation Points 1  Poland 128 2  West Germany 127 3  Hungary 126 4  Spain 102 5   Switzerland 84 6  Austria 64 7  Portugal 51 8  Ireland 40

Women

All semifinals were held on 5 July.^[2] First two teams qualified for the "A" final (plus Yugoslavia as the host). Places 3–4 qualified for the "B" final.

Semifinal 1 Held in Bodø, Norway Pos. Nation Points 1  Soviet Union 107 2  Hungary 86 3  Italy 80 4  Romania 77 5  Norway 60 6  Belgium 55.5 7   Switzerland 49.5 8  Greece 27

Semifinal 2 Held in Edinburgh, United Kingdom Pos. Nation Points 1  Great Britain 111 2  Bulgaria 83 3  Netherlands 82.5 4  Finland 66.5 5  France 66.5 6  Yugoslavia 51 7  Spain 41 8  Denmark 38.5

Semifinal 3 Held in Frankfurt, West Germany Pos. Nation Points 1  East Germany 112 2  West Germany 97 3  Czechoslovakia 81 4  Poland 79 5  Sweden 66 6  Austria 43 7  Ireland 38 8  Portugal 24

Preliminaries

First three teams advanced to the semifinals.

Held on 20 and 21 June in Esch-sur-Alzette, Luxembourg Men Pos. Nation Points 1  Denmark 71 2  Turkey 69 3  Ireland 64 4  Iceland 58 5  Luxembourg 37

Held on 20 June in Barcelona, Spain Women Pos. Nation Points 1  Spain 44 2  Greece 44 3  Portugal 34 4  Iceland 28

References

External links

• European Cup results (Men) from GBR Athletics
• European Cup results (Women) from GBR Athletics