Two athletes, three jaw-dropping performances – and one incredible evening of athletics.
In a town where they talk about ‘Hayward Magic’, it seemed present in astonishing abundance in Eugene on Sunday (24) as Nigeria’s Tobi Amusan and Sweden’s Mondo Duplantis produced scintillating displays of athletic sorcery, breaking world records in their respective events to close out the World Athletics Championships Oregon22 in unforgettable fashion.
As well as record-breaking feats there were some brilliant battles and host nation successes – both US teams won their respective 4x400m finals, while Athing Mu held off Keely Hodgkinson for the 800m title, Jakob Ingebrigtsen got 5000m gold, Malaika Mihambo retained her long jump title, Kevin Mayer took a second world decathlon triumph and Massimo Stano added the world 35km race walk title to his Olympic victory over 20km in Tokyo.
Men – Pole Vault – Statistical Summary
- Armand “Mondo” Duplantis (SWE) won the gold medal, as expected, adding this to his Tokyo 2020 Olympic gold medal and his silver medal from Doha 2019.
- Duplantis cleared 6.00 metres for the 47th time in his career, breaking a tie with Sergey Bubka of Ukraine, who had cleared that height 46 times.
- Duplantis continued to jump after he had clinched the title, clearing 6.06 on his 1st attempt. He then attempted 6.21, going for the world record. He made it on his 2nd attempt for the 3rd world record set at Oregon22, bettering his own mark of 6.20 set indoors in March at the World Indoors in Beograd, Serbia.
- Chris Nilsen (USA) won the silver, clearing 5.94 before missing three attempts at 6.00 metres.
- Ernest Obiena of the Philippines won bronze, the best finish for his nation in this event, after his performance in 2019, when he was 15th in qualifying. Obiena’s medal was also the first medal and the best finish by a Filipino athlete in any event at the World Championships. He had been tied with Marestella Torres in the 2005 women’s long jump.
- Obiena also vaulted 5.94, but had 1 miss at the height to lose the silver medal to Nilsen.
Renaud Lavillenie of France placed =5th, not able to add to his total of 5 medals in the event.
Women – 100 metre hurdles – Semi-Finals – Statistical Summary
Tobi Amusan (NGR) set a world record in the semi-finals, heat 1, running 12.12 to better the record of 12.20 of Keni Harrison (USA) from 2016, who finished 2nd to her in that heat. Amusan’s mark is the 1st world record set by a Nigerian woman.
Amusan’s mark is only the 4th world record set in the women’s 100 metre hurdles in a heat or semi-final, and the 1st such record in 36 years. The other two were set in the embryonic days of the event, back in 1969, just when the women were moving up from the 80 metre hurdles.
Harrison’s time of 12.27 behind Amusan is still the 11th fastest performance of all-time.
Brittney Anderson (JAM) won heat 3 in 12.31, which makes her the 9th fastest performer of all-time.
Jamaica and the United States both qualified 2 runners for the final.
