EJ Obiena barely missed out on securing a medal in the Paris Olympics men’s pole vault event as he settled for fourth place in the championship match early Tuesday (Philippine Time) at the Stade De France.
Despite seemingly good shots at 5.95 meters, Obiena saw the bar falling in all his tries as he failed to overtake either Greece’s Emmanouil Karalis, United States’ Sam Kendricks, and Sweden’s Mondo Duplantis at the podium.
Despite skipping 5.95 after one miss and fouling in his two tries at six meters, Karalis took the bronze through the countback tiebreaker over Obiena.
Obiena could have beaten Karalis for the bronze if the former cleared 5.95 meters
Kendricks, who cleared 5.95 meters in just one try, took home the silver.
Being the only player to clear six meters, Duplantis, to the surprise of virtually no one, won the gold, and he decided to go first for Thiago Braz’s Olympic record of 6.03 meters by telling the staff to set the bar at 6.1 meters.
In just one try, Duplantis broke the record with ease.
He then tried to break the world record that he set in Xiamen, China last April, and right on the final attempt of the night, Duplantis completed the 6.25-meter jump to the delight of the jampacked crowd.
Despite bowing out just before the podium finish formalities, Obiena finished remarkably better than his 11th-place stint in 2021.
It also came amid a back injury that he suffered during the build-up that nearly sent him to early elimination.
Earlier in the day in Paris’ metropolitan area, Lauren Hoffman crashed out of the women’s 400-meter hurdles event.
Hoffman clocked in at 58.28 seconds, way behind a pack of six runners who were just at most 0.6 seconds apart from each other in Heat 3 of the repechage.
Shana Grebo of France gave her hometown crowd something to cheer for as she won the heat at a time of 54.91 seconds, while Anna Ryzhykova finished second at 54.95 to seal the last two berths in the semifinals.
Philippine athletics’ hope to land a Paris Olympics medal now lies on John Tolentino, who will play in the repechage of the 110-meter hurdles later Tuesday. (PNA)
