BERLIN — Estonian discus thrower Gerd Kanter was the sole Baltic medalist at the recently completed 12th World Athletic Championships in Berlin.

Kanter earned his bronze in the men’s discus with a best throw of 66.71 meters, nearly 5 off his best throw (71.64 meters) this summer. Qualifying for the final in second place, Kanter was upstaged by German Robert Harting, who threw a personal best of 69.43 in front of his home crowd. Second place went to Polish athlete Piotr Milachowski who broke his country’s national record with a throw of 69.15.

Latvia’s best medal chance Ainars Kovals could not find the form that had seen him win a silver medal in the javelin at last year’s Summer Olympics. In Berlin, he only managed a best throw of 81.74 which saw him finish in seventh place. It was a long way of the throw that saw him win silver in Beijing (86.64).

Lithuania’s best hopes were in the hands of Beijing Summer Olympics discus bronze medalist Virgilijus Alekna. However, he could not repeat his form of almost 12 months previous, with his best throw of 66.36 seeing him finish just outside of the medals in fourth place.

Other athletes to finish in the top-10 of their respective events at the meet were Lithuanian Kristina Saltanovic who finished eighth in the women’s 20 km. walk and Estonian Ksenija Balta who finished eighth in the women’s long-jump.