Carolina Kluft says Jessica Ennis will take European heptathlon record

Carolina Kluft believes it is only a matter of time before Jessica Ennis breaks her European heptathlon points record, the second highest score of all time, behind Jackie Joyner-Kersee. The Swede, who is the only heptathlete to have won three world titles, has retired from the discipline in order to focus on the long jump. "I follow the results and I'm guessing my European record will soon be beaten by Jess," said Kluft, 27. "I think so for sure, she's got the capacity. Maybe not this year but if she would get seven good events in a row. That's the difficult part to get all seven events good in one competition but when she does she will break my record and she is so much worthy of breaking that record. "I think maybe the dream is that she will break it in London [in 2012] – home track, Olympic gold and European record, that would be something. I shouldn't say that, maybe she will feel the pressure but she's got the capacity and she's a great girl and the record should be beaten." The two women greeted each other fondly ahead of today's New York Diamond League meeting, in which Ennis, the world heptathlon champion, will be competing in a three-event challenge of 100 metre hurdles, long jump and shot. "I actually haven't seen Carolina for a few years," said Ennis. "The last time I competed against her was in Osaka 2007. It's been a while." On hearing that Kluft predicted she would take her European record, of 7,032 points, the 24-year-old laughed. "I don't know about that. It's nice to hear her say such nice things as she dominated the event for so long. She's the one I look up to and would like to be like so for her to say things like that is quite special." Despite the fevered interest in when Ennis might break her next targeted record – Denise Lewis's British mark of 6,831 is 100 points ahead of Ennis's best – the Sheffield athlete says she will not get caught up in the numbers game. "I don't want to get too fixated about records," she said. "I don't want to think that it's all about the British record when it's not. It should come if I get everything else right – but it's not the be all and end all." This afternoon at the Icahn Stadium Ennis hopes to improve on her long jump, an event that has troubled her since she changed take-off legs after the injury that ruled her out of the Beijing Olympics in 2008. Ennis will be up against America's Hyleas Fountain, a heptathlon Olympic silver medallist and long-jump specialist, and she believes the event to be the right competitive environment in which to work on one of the major elements that can take her to the next level and – perhaps – one step closer towards Kluft's record.