Sweden's Armand Duplantis aka "Mondo" enthralled the crowd of 80,000 at the Stade de France as he broke the world record for the ninth time in four years to win gold medal at the Paris Olympics 2024. In his third attempt with King of Sweden, Carl XVI Gustaf and Queen Silvia along with his parents, coaches, competitors and girlfriend in attendance, Duplantis cleared the 6.25 metre mark to break the world record and Olympic record (6.10 metre).
Duplantis first broke the world record in February 2020. He broke the record eight times, one centimetre at a time. Earlier, this year in Xiamen Diamond League, he broke the record with 6.24 metre. At the Olympics, he pushed it one metre again.
Duplantis was not competing with other vaulters but with himself. Even his competitors joined the thousands as Duplantis rested the pole on his shoulder to break the world record in his third attempt. USA's Sam Kendricks won the silver medal with 5.95 metre, 30cm less than Duplantis. Greece's Emmanouil Karalis won the bronze medal with 5.90m. Duplantis’ competitors were in awe of what he had achieved as a 24-year-old.
Duplantis ecstatic after leaving the dream
As Duplantis successfully broke the world record, the sound at the Stade de France was deafening. He ran towards his girlfriend and hugged her.
“I haven’t processed how fantastic that moment was," the young Swede said after his historic jump. "It’s one of those things that don’t really feel real, such an out-of-body experience. It’s still hard to kind of land right now.
"What can I say? I just broke a world record at the Olympics, the biggest possible stage for a pole vaulter. [My] biggest dream since a kid was to break the world record at the Olympics, and I’ve been able to do that in front of the most ridiculous crowd I’ve ever competed in front of.”
Duplantis compares crowd to the ones at American football game
Duplantis explained his experience of breaking the world record in front of a huge crowd as they chanted "Mundo-Mundo" when he attempted to set another world record.
“I tried to clear my thoughts as much as I could. The crowd was going crazy. It was so loud in there, it sounded like an American football game. I have a little bit of experience being in a 100,000-capacity stadium, but I was never the centre of attention. [I was] just trying to channel the energy everybody was giving me, and they were giving me a lot of it. It worked out,” he added.
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