As pole vault world champion Nina Kennedy took Australia to its 18th gold medal at the Paris Olympics, the nation’s best medal haul at the Games, she soared to new heights. After Kennedy had charged towards the uprights, forcefully planting her pole in the box, the 27-year-old flew upwards, gracefully lifting over the bar, before dropping cleanly to clear 4.90m. Kennedy did not know it at the time, but it would be the jump that won her gold.
It felt like an apt metaphor for an extraordinary Wednesday from the Australian Olympic team, the best single day in the team’s history, with a total of four golds and two bronze medals. What more appropriate way for the Australians to fly past history and make Paris 2024 the nation’s best Olympics yet?
Kennedy became the first Australian to win pole vault gold since Steven Hooker at the Beijing Olympics in 2008, and the first Australian woman to win gold, bettering Tatiana Grigorieva’s silver medal at the Sydney 2000 Games.
The bar started low, with Kennedy easily clearing 4.40m on her first attempt. She was again comfortable at 4.60m, before suffering a minor mishap at 4.70m. But any fears of an early exit – Kennedy bowed out at 4.40m three years ago in Tokyo, as she battled an injury – were quickly allayed as the Australian soared over on the second attempt.
From there, while the field slimmed, Kennedy looked flawless. She took a deep breath at 4.80m, waited in contemplation, before clearing on her first attempt. When the bar was raised five centimetres, Kennedy was again untroubled – waiting for the jump clock to hit 20 seconds before charging forward and sailing over the bar. She was the only vaulter to clear 4.85m on the first attempt, and the only remaining competitor to clear 4.90m (again, on the first attempt).
With just three athletes left, defending champion Katie Moon from the United States and Canada’s Alysha Newman, Kennedy found herself in the gold medal position. Newman failed to clear 4.90m, while after an unsuccessful attempt, Moon elected to pass on to 4.95m. The American and Kennedy both missed their first attempts at the new height, but Moon had one less chance to give. When Moon failed to clear again, Kennedy did not need to try again.
“I knew first-attempt clearances at those high bars were going to take the gold,” Kennedy said afterwards. “I put all my focus into that exact second, and that’s how I won.”
Kennedy had shared the gold medal with Moon at last year’s world championships, after the pair were level at 4.90m and both failed to clear 4.95m. The Australian has been asked repeatedly in recent months whether she would consider splitting Paris gold.
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“Deep down I knew I wasn’t going to,” she said. “I wanted that outright gold medal. I became really confident in talking to the media, it was really scary, really vulnerable, to lay it all out there and say: ‘I want the fucking outright gold medal, this is what I want.’ That’s really scary – I’m just really happy I got the job done.”
Matthew Denny continued Australia’s medal rush in the discus, winning the bronze medal with a throw of 69.31m. Three years ago in Tokyo, the Queenslander was an agonising five centimetres short of third place. But there would be no such heartbreak in Paris, with Denny almost a metre clear of the fourth place throw. Jamaica’s Rojé Stona won gold with an Olympic record throw of 70.00m. Denny’s medal is the first Olympic medal for an Australian in an Olympic throwing event – discus, shot put, hammer throw and javelin.
The medals at the track capped off a remarkable day which began with bronze in the morning for Jemima Montag and Rhydian Cowley in the mixed relay race walk marathon. Then, across a handful of hours in the afternoon, it rained gold: gold for Matthew Wearn in the sailing; gold for Keegan Palmer in the skateboarding; and gold in the men’s team pursuit on the track. The four golds and two bronze medals eclipses Australia’s prior best day of Olympic action, four gold medals in quick succession in Tokyo.