Party time for Bernard after bronze is sealed

While his mum was celebrating her 60th birthday, Bernard was negotiating a torrential downpour in Barcelona en-route to the greatest result of his career.

The wet conditions had already seen British team-mate Tom Parsons bow out at 2.19m and Bernard looked set to join him after failing with two attempts at 2.23m.

But after negotiating that height and then nailing 2.29m first time around, the 25-year-old Wakefield Harrier had one foot on the podium.

As it was he was pushed onto the third rung by Russians Aleksander Shustov and Ivan Ukhov who took gold and silver respectively after Bernard failed at 2.31m.

But even that could not put a dampener on Bernard's celebrations, and he said: "It's my mum's birthday so this will be going on her mantelpiece like the rest of my medals.

"We are going to have a good party when we get home. I was confident I could pick something up – it would have been nice to do a personal best but nevertheless it was pretty good.

"I just love being at major championships. I did not get to go to the World Championships last year Berlin because of injury and wasn't expecting to get to Barcelona because at one point my ankle was looking like a pin cushion.

"When I was on my third attempt at 2.23m it was not looking good after I did not come in for the opening height. But then I cleared that and then I came in at my first attempt at 2.29m.

"I think I managed to get the right bars at the right time and it was a shame about not clearing 2.31m because on my first and second I was fairly close."

A season's best jump in Catalonia not only secured Britain's best high jump result in the European Championships since Dalton Grant's silver in 1998 but it has also given Bernard the confidence that he can mix it with the world's best.

And he revealed his relief at opting to skip 2.26m after one attempt to make it all-or-nothing at 2.29m – which is just one centimetre below his personal best.

He said: "At 2.26m I just chopped it off narrowly so I thought, I'm not going to gain anything by trying it again so I went for 2.29m knowing that if I did it first time, it would put me in a good position.

"I walked around for half an hour, visualised it and when it came to it, I made sure I got it. And this gives me a lot of confidence for next year because the same guys are going to be competing at the World Championships and other countries don't do as well in this event as Europe does.

"I've got different medals on different stages and next year I'm looking to get that top spot. It's a good stepping stone to pick up something."

Team-mate Parsons was not smiling however, the 26-year-old from Birmingham crashing out with three failures at the opening height.

"It has to be to do with the conditions because there is no way I would not clear 2.19 in good conditions," Parsons said. "It's by far the worst conditions I have competed in, you could hear your feet squelching on the track.

"I've probably not done enough practice in the rain this year, but I was too cautious with my first two attempts. I added more speed on the third and cleared the bar but just clipped it with my heel. I just did not deal with it well enough."

Triple jumper Phillips Idowu is already targeting the one gold medal currently missing from his collection after claiming the European title with a superb performance.

Idowu set a new personal best of 17.81m in the triple jump final to beat Romania's Marian Oprea and France's Teddy Tamgho to the title.

The 31-year-old is now the reigning World, European and Commonwealth champion, with Portugal's Nelson Evora only denying him the Olympic title in Beijing in 2008 by five centimetres.

And the Londoner admitted the Olympics in his home city in 2012 are now foremost in his mind.

"There's one more medal in my career I need to win and that's in a couple of years' time," he said. "I just want to get home to my babies and my family. My job in Barcelona is done.

"I came here to win the medal, I won the medal and now I want to go home and celebrate and look forward to the end of the season and preparation towards 2012."

Idowu led from start to finish with jumps of 17.46m, 17.47m and 17.40m followed by 17.81m in the fourth round, eclipsing his previous personal best of 17.73m set in winning the world title in Berlin last year.

Tamgho was expected to be the major threat after jumping a world-leading 17.98m in New York in June, but the 21-year-old had to settle for bronze with a best of 17.45m, Oprea taking a surprise silver with 17.51m in the fifth round.

"It's been tough all year but me and my coach (Aston Moore) got it right," Idowu added. "We put it together, we planned for this day. So all the meetings from May until here didn't matter.

"I've suffered a lot of defeats and I'm sure the press and media thought I didn't have it in me, but I had to take knocks and be strong-minded.

"I just seem to come into these championships and do what I do. I work hard, I always work hard, and by the grace of God I come out as a gold medallist. It's amazing."

Asked about his personal best, Idowu added: "I knew I had to do that. I knew back in March (at the world indoors in Doha) with the way Teddy was jumping it would need a PB, a big jump to win."

Elsewhere, Dai Greene and Rhys Williams advanced to the 400m hurdles final and Christian Malcolm and Marlon Devonish reached the 200m final.

Mo Farah and Chris Thompson, first and second in the 10,000m on Tuesday, also eased into tomorrow's final of the 5,000m to keep alive their dreams of a long-distance double.

Michael Rimmer also looked a genuine gold medal contender after comfortably winning his 800m semi-final, but Laura Turner was unable to reach the 100m final after finishing a disappointing fifth in her semi-final in 11.41secs.

Aviva's support, both at home and abroad, is helping the team prepare to compete at their best. Watch the Aviva GB & NI Team live in action at the Aviva London Grand Prix. For more details visit aviva.co.uk/athletics