(Photo World Athletics/Gladys Chai von der Laage)
Armand Duplantis broke the world record in the pole vault, clearing 6.17m at the Orlen Copernicus Cup in Torun, Poland, the fourth stop of the World Athletics Indoor Tour, on Saturday (8).
Competing in just his second competition of the 2020 season, the 20-year-old Swede added one centimetre to the mark set by Renaud Lavillenie in Donetsk, Ukraine, in 2014.
Duplantis cleared the record height on his second attempt, which came on his sixth jump of the competition.
“It’s something that I wanted since I was three years old,” Duplantis said. “It’s a big year, but it’s a good way to start it.”
With the five other starters in the field topping out at 5.52m, the evening was all but an exhibition for Duplantis, who went on with first attempt clearances at 5.72m, 5.92m and 6.01m. On his first attempt at 6.17m, he brushed the bar with his thigh on the way up, sending it crashing down. Despite the miss, Duplantis felt his confidence soar.
“After that first attempt, I thought, ‘yeah, I just need two more attempts at this and I got it’. I was pretty confident that I had it.”
He only needed one more. It wasn’t clean – again he brushed it slightly on the way up – but the bar stayed on as he sailed back down to earth. For the first time, as a world record holder.
Competing alone, he became the master of his own destiny. He played it well.
“I got to pick my heights. For this kind of situation where I could pick my heights and do whatever I wanted, and when I was ready to just put it up to 6.17m, it played well.”
The record caps a sensational and unprecedented rise in the discipline by Duplantis, a pole-vaulting wunderkind who began setting age group records at age seven. It will probably take some time for the magnitude of his achievement to set in.
“How do you explain a dream that’s been a dream since you were three years old? It’s a big dream, too. It’s not a little dream. And it’s a whole process building up to that moment. I can’t really get my head around it.”
He’s got time for that. He won’t be back in competition again until next Saturday in Glasgow.
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