Young jumpers wet feet in the big leagues

WHEN YOUNG Jamaicans Jaydon Hibbert steps on to the runway at the Monaco Diamond League meet on July 21, the 18-year-old University of Arkansas student-athlete will face a whole new world. Hibbert leads the world in the men’s triple jump, but he has never faced the world’s best.

Hibbert will be able to look eye to eye for the first time at Pablo Pedro Pichardo, the transplanted Cuban who won the 2021 Olympic gold and last year’s World Championships for Portugal; the great American Christian Taylor, who has the longest jump ever in Monaco at 17.82, done in 2019; and this year’s world number three, Andy Hernández of Cuba.

Injuries and time have taken the edge off Taylor’s legs, but Pichardo and Hernández are still flying. Hernández, whose transfer to Italy won’t be complete until next year, has already done 17.75, and Pichardo is one of six men to have ever surpassed 18 metres.

Even though she did the triple jump at last year’s World Championships, Jamaica’s Ackelia Smith is in a similar position.

NEW EXPERIENCE

Monaco will provide a new experience, with the University of Texas jumper facing Germany’s World and Olympic champion Malaika Mihambo, former world indoor winner Ivana Vuelta, and in form Italian Larissa Iapichino for the first time.

Smith won the NCAA title and leads the world with a mark of 7.08 metres, with entertaining American Tara Davis-Woodhall at 7.07.

The meet will feature four fantastic 400-metre hurdlers. The three fastest men in history – Norwegian Karsten Warholm, Rai Benjamin of the US, and World Champion Alison dos Santos of Brazil – will meet again, with dos Santos heralding his return to full fitness with a fast flat 400 of 44.73 seconds on the weekend.

Hurdles queen Sydney McLaughlin-Levrone will continue her 2023 pursuit of the flat 400 world record. She started 2023 with a personal best of 50.07 seconds and has steadily cut and carved that down to 48.74. In Monaco, she will have Natallia Kaczmarek, the second fastest Pole of all time, to keep her honest.

The only Polish athlete faster than Kaczamerek’s recent benchmark of 49.48 seconds is the legendary Irena Szewinska, who won the 1976 Olympic gold medal in what was then a world record 49.29 seconds.

When you add the presence in the mile of 1500-metre queen Faith Kipyegon, it makes Monaco a wonderful meet in prospect.

For those watching through black-green-and-gold glasses, Hibbert and Smith will have a chance to be star struck by Mihambo and Pichardo and to get over it in time for next month’s World Championship. At that time, in Budapest, there will be no place for sentiment.

Hubert Lawrence has made notes at track side since 1980.