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Despite the pandemic, there was still something to watch in athletics this year.
Perseverer Joshua Cheptegei broke one record after another, and obstacle player Karsten Warholm, bowler Ryan Crouser and javelin thrower Johannes Vetter were also approaching the world maximum.
But he was in front of everyone Armand Duplantis.
The world record holders are numbered, the triple jumper Rojasová and the pole vaulter Duplantis rule |
“It was a special season, not only for me, but for everyone,” said the 21-year-old pole vaulter. “But I managed to get together and achieved quite good results.”
The Swedish athlete in the hall twice shifted the best record of all time to the value of 618 centimeters, outside he then scored 615 centimeters and overcame the legendary Ukrainian Sergei Bubka.
And for his performances, World Athletics awarded him the Athlete of the Year award.
“It’s great when people describe me as the face of the sport. On the other hand, it’s nothing I have to have, “he said. “I’m just trying to jump high, improve and break records.”
The record was the most for them
Before the start of this season, he set a big goal. “I feel good, I think I have a chance at Olympic gold,” Duplantis planned at the time.
He kept confirming his words. At a February meeting in Toruń, he first set a new world record with a performance of 617 centimeters, and a week later in Glasgow he improved the record to 618 centimeters.
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8. february 2020 at 22:09, post archived: 7. december 2020 at 8:45
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“At the age of four, I announced at home: I’ll jump a world record one day,” Duplantis recalled. “Sure, I wanted all the gold medals, but that record meant more to me.”
He fulfilled his promise at the age of twenty.
“Tears almost came to my eyes. I looked at the bar and saw it there: Armand Duplantis – a world record. It was an amazing moment, “he said.
But joyful emotions were replaced by feelings of insecurity a few weeks later. The world was hit by a coronavirus pandemic and Duplantis learned: the Olympics have been postponed.
“It’s annoying,” he regretted. “But given the current situation, we have to understand that. We have to understand that some things are more important than sports. “
During the race break, he kind of returned to his childhood.
He spent time with his Swedish mother and American father. At home in Louisiana, he had reconstructed his diving sector in the garden, remembering how his neighbors had once been afraid of jumping into the backyard.
He diversified the race break with an exhibition race. Together with Renaud Lavilleni and Sam Kendricks, they competed in the distance, who will cross the five-meter high bar more than once in half an hour.
Both Duplantis and Lavillenie had done it thirty-six times.
He does not lose motivation
When the season started again, Duplantis continued to rule.
“I’m in good shape again,” he was pleased. “Personally, it was perhaps even more impressive for me than my indoor season, because I hadn’t done anything in two months before.”
During the September Diamond League in Rome, he rewrote the historical tables – this time the outdoor ones. With a performance of 615 centimeters, he surpassed the 26-year-old best record of Bubka.
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3. december 2020 at 20:26, post archived: 7. december 2020 at 8:39
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“I landed on the mat, but I haven’t returned to the ground yet. I’m still up in the clouds, “he rejoiced then. “It’s a huge relief, finally the others will stop asking me when I will break the record.”
As he planned in his youth, he already has world records. What’s next? “There are still a lot of medals I could win, and there are still a lot of things I can do,” he looks out.
He already has gold from the European Championships in Berlin in 2018, but he lacks the most valuable metal from the world (last year he was silver behind the American Kendricks in Doha) and, of course, from the Olympic Games.
“If you want to make history as the best, you have to show up at the right time when you really need it,” he knows. “I like to consider myself a big event racer, I can succeed when it matters.”
Which he confirmed many times this year.
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