Yulimar Rojas celebrates her world triple jump record in Belgrade (© Getty Images)
Every so often in sport, an athlete comes along with a level of talent so otherworldly, and a biological composition so perfectly suited to an event, that it seems, as the old cliche goes, they were simply born to do it.
Yulimar Rojas is that kind of athlete.
When she takes to the triple jump runway the Venezuelan, who stands at 1.92m, holds thousands of fans captive in her grasp – her speed, power and astonishing elasticity offering up the promise of something ridiculous, something absurd, as she bounces off the board and bounds towards the sand.
On the final day of the World Athletics Indoor Championships Belgrade 22, that’s exactly what occurred, Rojas setting an outright world record with her 15.74m in the sixth round.
Her closest rival was a full metre behind.
That sense of timing, showmanship and electrifying entertainment has become Rojas’s trademark. She did the same in Tokyo, saving her best for the final round, where she smashed the world record with 15.67m.
So, what is it about saving her best for last?
“I’ll tell you the truth, I don’t know,” she says. “It didn’t feel any different, but it is the jump for glory. Maybe one day I’ll be known as 'the girl of the sixth jump'.”
She’s 26 now, and Rojas has already done it all, won it all. What’s left? One specific number.
“I was born to jump 16 metres,” she says. “This is what inspires me to inspire others to achieve their dreams, and help athletics remain the best sport in the world.”
At the Stark Arena in Belgrade on Sunday, it was hard to disagree with her assessment, Rojas’s feat the highlight of a remarkable morning of athletics. As she sat underneath the stadium an hour later, trying to make sense of what she’d done, she said the day “has been like living a dream”.
What makes her story all the more inspiring is how high she has climbed from such humble beginnings. Born in Caracas, Rojas grew up in Pozuelos, an underprivileged area outside the coastal town of Puerto la Cruz.
She started her athletics journey as a high jumper, clearing 1.81m at the age of 15. She turned to the long jump in 2013, leaping a Venezeulan U20 record of 6.23m and the following year she started triple jumping, leaping 13.65m at the age of 18.
Her link-up with current coach Ivan Pedroso is owed, in essence, to the Facebook algorithm that suggested the four-time world long jump champion and 2000 Olympic gold medallist as a friend. Rojas wrote to Pedroso about how much she admired him, and he invited her to train with him at his base in Guadalajara, Spain.
“It was destiny,” says Rojas.
That was in 2015 and she’s been improving ever since, winning world outdoor titles in 2017 and 2019 and world indoor titles in 2016, 2018 and, of course, 2022. Rojas has been undefeated in the triple jump for two and a half years, stringing together a series of performances that’s never been witnessed in the sport.
She has changed the game, and it in turn has changed her.
“Athletics is my whole life,” she says. “It’s made me the person I am, put so many amazing people in my life: my coach, my training partners. It made me a better person.”
Pedroso’s group includes a horde of other world-class jumpers, and the vibe there is a blend of laid-back fun and serious, resolute commitment to perfecting their craft.
“We’re like a family,” says Rojas. “We all have individual goals, but we all work together and support one another.”
In Belgrade, Rojas got a vivid reminder of the power of sport – just how deeply it can enrich the lives of both participants and those watching.
Finishing second to her in the triple jump with a jump of 14.74m was Maryna Bekh-Romanchuk, one of six Ukrainian athletes competing in the Serbian capital as a war rages on in their native country.
“I’m particularly happy for Maryna,” said Rojas. “I am happy because women have stood up. In Ukraine there is a war which does not make sense. It shouldn’t be like this, but I’m happy to see Ukrainian athletes competing here, showing they can be successful.”
Rojas’s home nation has had its own issues for many years, and while the severity of such crises might trivialise the importance of sport, what it also does is highlight how much of a welcome distraction, an uplifting euphoria, it provides to so many.
“I know the people back in my country should be celebrating,” says Rojas. “Yes, there have been difficult moments there, but I’m very happy to show what Venezuelan people can achieve.”
Coming to Belgrade, Rojas knew she could achieve something special.
Her first triple jump competition of the year, when she jumped 15.41m in Madrid, proved as much. In her first few jumps in Belgrade, she “made some mistakes” and looked utterly displeased after opening with 15.19m, a jump that would still have easily won gold.
But such is Rojas’s brilliance that, these days, she competes not so much against her rivals as with herself, and with history.
Such is her relationship with Pedroso that during Sunday’s final, little needed to be said, Rojas knowing intuitively when the technical aspects of her run-up or three jumping phases was slightly askew.
“Ivan and I are very connected, we are one person,” she says. “We don’t even need to talk. We know what the other is thinking.”
And after she unleashed the best triple jump in history by a woman, she quickly deflected praise to her long-time coach. “He deserves just as much credit as I do for this jump,” she says.
One of her next goals is to surpass her mentor. Pedroso won four world outdoor long jump titles, five world indoor titles, and one Olympic gold. Rojas wants more.
“He knows I can get there,” she says. “He knows I will do it.”
Those who witnessed Rojas float over the track and out, up and away into that sand were treated to a sight that will stick with them forever – as indeed will the legacy of Rojas’s performances.
She’s an athlete who took her physical gifts and used them to transform her life, transcend her sport, and her years of work and dedication are now taking the women’s triple jump into the stratosphere.
“Nothing is impossible, that is my motto, and it’s what I believe in,” she says. “If you work with your heart, your belief, your love of the sport, nothing is impossible.”
Cathal Dennehy for World Athletics
