Sweden’s Duplantis sets a new world record in pole vault
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Belgrade (AFP) – Sweden’s Mondo Duplantis was improving its world record in pole vault at the World Indoor Championships in Belgrade on Sunday.
Duplantis finished 6.20 meters for the third time when he asked under cool conditions at Stark Arena to improve his previous best set by 1 cm two weeks ago in the same Serbian venue.
The Swede joined the competition with the bar of 5.60 m and continued to pass four times when rivals fell in the way.
Duplantis saw the American Chris Nilsen fail at 5.95 m and the Brazilian Olympic champion in Rio Thiago Braz at 6.05 m.
The bar was immediately raised to 6.20 m, but Duplantis failed in its first two attempts in chaotic, noisy scenes when 4×400 m relays were held on the track.
After they were done, the Swede took a deep breath and shot down the bright blue track, the crowd exploded as he sailed over the bar.
The 22-year-old Swedish Olympic champion had warned when he cleared 6.19m in an almost empty arena on March 7 that he had more in mind.
Duplantis has held the world record since February 2020, when he managed 6.17 m in Torun in Poland and then 6.18 m in Glasgow at one-week intervals.
Sometimes he seems to be able to raise the record one centimeter at a time, like the Soviet and Ukrainian great Sergey Bubka, who at the time when outdoors and indoors were considered separate, broke the world record outdoors 17 times and set the indoor best 18 times between 1984 and 1994.
World Athletics has eliminated the difference between indoor and outdoor pole vault records.
Duplantis, nicknamed “Mondo”, was born and raised in Lafayette, Louisiana, but competes for Sweden through his mother, who trains him with his father.
He became European Champion 2018 in Berlin at just 18 years old, and took the Olympic title last summer in Tokyo with a jump of 6.02m.
The indoor world title was one of the two missing from his record, along with the world’s outdoors.
He will have the opportunity to have a tilt at it in July in Eugene, Oregon.
© 2022 AFP