On March 8, Beijing time, Swedish men's pole vaulter Duplantis jumped 6.19 meters in the indoor competition held in Belgrade, breaking the men's pole vault world record of 6.18 meters previously held by him. It is also the third time in the past 25 months that Duplantis has broken the project's world record.
At the Tokyo Olympics seven months ago, Duplantis, who had already locked up the first Olympic gold medal of his career, and the new world record of the men's pole vault at 6.19 meters regrettably passed by, when the teenagers were eager for new challenges and carried endless expectations. Seven months later, at the Belgrade indoor track and field race, the Swedish genius with high morale and wished to win the new record of 6.19 meters.
For Duplantis, it was a game that was both familiar and unfamiliar. The reason for the familiarity is for the new world height of 6.19 meters, which he has put in for two years, as he recalled after the race, "Challenging the 6.19 meters altitude, I probably tried 50 times. But the difference is that after more than 50 attempts, he finally experienced the joy of fist-waving celebration after taking off over the crossbar at this height.
The first few rounds of the competition still did not have much suspense. After completing the jump at an altitude of 5.61 meters and crossing the 5.85 meters and 6.00 meters in a row, Duplantis began a routine "punch card mission" – once again striking a new world record. And the suspense also continued to the last moment, after the first two failed, the third attempt to jump Duplantis jumped up, the body swung in a graceful arc in the air, although the knee slightly touched the crossbar, but this time, he finally rewrote the world record as he wished.
This is the fourth time the 22-year-old has broken the world record in two years. The first was in February 2020, when he jumped 6.17 meters at the Toruń Indoors in Poland, breaking the world record for London Olympic gold medalist Lavillegne, a week later he rewrote the record again with 6.18 meters. In September of the same year, he broke the world record of 6.14 meters in the outdoor pole vault set by Bubka in 1994 with a score of 6.15 meters in the Diamond League In Rome.
So far, only 14 men have crossed the 6.00m high jump in the indoor arena, but the Swedes are the only ones to set consecutive records of 6.17m, 6.18m and 6.19m. The IAAF once gave Duplantis this assessment: "The sky is his limit." The reason why he was able to become the "ruler" of the sport at this age also stemmed from Duplantis's efforts and persistence in training.
"I don't think it's the highest jump I've jumped, there will be higher altitudes in the future." The most emblematic manifestation of "persistence" in Duplantis is the desire to shock the world record beyond ordinary people. After setting a new world record of 6.19 meters, his answer has become more and more certain, and now he is still 1 centimeter ahead of the crazy goal of "bringing the men's pole jump into the 6.20 meters era".
That's a goal That Duplantis only officially announced after last year's Tokyo Olympics, but now for him, the 2022 FIA Indoor Championships, to be held next week at the same venue in Belgrade, is undoubtedly the best chance to achieve that goal – after all, he has never won the stage at the World Championships and the Indoor World Championships, where gold medals and a world record of 6.20 meters are Duplantis' next goal.
"Belgrade is really a great place to compete for the title and I will try to set a higher record there." Duplantis still shows the world his ambitions, ready to "fly" to the next incredible height.
Wen | Yang Zhonghua
Edit | Peppery Soup