Oregon high jump medal is a silver lining for Ukraine’s Protsenko

He did what he could. Andriy Protsenko had no other choice. In a village in the Ukrainian countryside – the location of which he’d rather not share – the high jumper tried to find some normality amid the horrific uncertainty of war.

His sole concern, while waiting in that home through February and March, was his family’s safety, but with little else to do all day, he took refuge in his training routine, aware that if he could somehow keep up his fitness than maybe some way, somehow, he could win a medal at the World Athletics Championships Oregon22.

On 24 February, the day Russia launched a military invasion of Ukraine, Protsenko left his home city of Kherson along with his wife Katerina and two daughters, Sofia (5) and Polina (9 months).

At their new location, safe from harm, all possible sports facilities were inaccessible, which meant Protsenko had to improvise. He searched around for materials he could use to continue training, fashioning home-made hurdles out of materials in his yard, lifting weights by adding car tyres to a bar he found lying around.

He did plyometric exercises, drills and sprints in a local field.

“There was no high jumping, but I found the possibility to run,” he says through an interpreter. “It was not so difficult to find something to create the equipment. The main thing was to find the motivation to train – but fortunately I could do it.”

In Eugene on Monday night, his hard work finally paid off, Protsenko earning bronze in the men’s high jump final with a clearance of 2.33m – a seven-centimetre improvement on his season’s best.

It was his seventh appearance at the championships – he competed at every edition since Berlin in 2009 – and his first final, his first medal; proof, on so many fronts, that persistence pays off.

“I’m like a wine,” he says. “The older, the better.”

Protsenko was 13 when he first discovered high jumping, and it’s safe to say he wasn’t keen back then. He was running 300m races at the time when his coach, Zuiev Gennadii, told him he should give high jumping a go.

“I didn’t know what it was and whether it was a good idea,” he says.

But he clearly had a talent for it, and Gennaddii has nurtured that ability to this day. At the age of 19, Protsenko cleared 2.21m to win silver at the European U20 Championship and, at 20, he soared over 2.30m for the first time.

In 2014 he won silver at both the World Indoor Championships in Sopot and the European Championships in Zurich, and also cleared 2.40m, putting him joint-sixth on the world all-time list. At the 2016 Rio Olympics, he finished tied for fourth in the high jump, beaten to bronze on countback by teammate Bogdan Bondarenko after both cleared 2.33m.

His wait for that first medal at a major global outdoor championships was to go on but this, of all years, seemed an unlikely year to get it. When he left his home in February, he was only able to take one bag with him and with his home city since occupied by Russian forces, returning was never an option.

“Everything is relative, but at first it was like a silence,” he says of those first few weeks at the countryside village. “That village was relatively safe but then Russian military (approached it) and we understood it’s time (to leave).”

He left on 13 April, going to the west of Ukraine until 22 April. “When we changed city I could train maximum four times a week,” he says. “But it was not the training athletes usually do.”

He managed to then relocate to Portugal, and after that to Spain. “These countries and their federations helped us so much,” he says.

Protsenko’s family is currently in France, being assisted by aid agencies, and after he is reunited with them later this week they will all move to Poland, where his coach is currently based with a group of Ukrainian athletes.

He can’t wait to get back and show them his shiny piece of excess baggage.

Protsenko says “there are no secrets” to what he accomplished in Eugene – his achievement all the more impressive given he fought through heel pain in the final. “I just gathered myself to show this result in the right moment.”

He had some nervous moments at 2.27m, which he cleared on the third attempt, but he was perfect over 2.30m and 2.33m, before two failures at 2.35m and one at 2.37m. This time around, though, he was on the right side of the countback coin, edging Olympic champion Gianmarco Tamberi to bronze – both clearing a best of 2.33m.

Tamberi, who sported a Ukrainian flag on his shoulder alongside Protsenko’s name during the World Indoors in Belgrade, was gracious in defeat. “We appreciate it, really,” Protsenko said of the support he received.

Mutaz Essa Barshim, the Qatari great who won his third world title with a world lead of 2.37m, also paid tribute to Protsenko’s achievement.

“He’s a champion,” he said. “He fought, despite everything he’d been going through. He showed up and produced a performance. It wasn’t easy for him but he’s up here, a medallist – you’ve got to give him that.”

Protsenko’s sponsor, Adidas, has helped him out substantially in recent months, sending him what gear and shoes he needs as he continues his training at various locations, and with a world bronze in the bag, he’s looking for more of the same at the European Championships in Munich next month and at the Wanda Diamond League final in Zurich in September.

But even now, he’s living a life of great uncertainty.

“It’s a terrible situation,” he says. “I’m afraid it could be a long time (before it’s possible to return home) but I ask the world to support Ukraine. Ukrainians are strong and we hold each other together. I will try to help Ukraine in every way I can.”

He has done that this week through his performances, but given Protsenko’s belief that he ages like a fine wine, surely an Olympic medal in 2024 is now in his plans?

Protsenko smiles, and he doesn’t need an interpreter to answer that one: “I hope.”

Cathal Dennehy for World Athletics