40 Days to Go
Alina Anatolyivna Shukh (born February 12, 1999) is a heptathlete from Ukraine. At the 2017 World Championships in Athletics, she competed in the women's heptathlon. At the Ukrainian Team Championships in Lutsk in August 2020, Ukraine's Alina Shukh broke her three-year-old lifetime best in the heptathlon.
Shukh won the European U20 title in Grosseto in 2017 with 6381 points, and in her first heptathlon of the season, she surpassed that total with a world-leading total of 6386 points. “Not bad for a first competition, but I still think I can do a lot better!” Shukh expressed herself on her Instagram page. Shukh dominated the first day of competition with a 1.91m high jump clearance, and she finished strong with a javelin throw of 53.64m and a fast 2:11.31 in the 800m, which put her five points ahead of her previous career best. Shukh would almost definitely have broken the 6400 point barrier in the 200m if the wind had been more favorable, but a 2.2 m/s breeze held her back to a respectable 26.62.
Kayle "Kyle" Blignaut (born November 9, 1999) is a shot put specialist from South Africa. At the 2018 IAAF World U20 Championships in Tampere, Blignaut won gold. In 2018, while representing Monument High at a schools track and field event in Potchefstroom, he broke the national junior mark of 20.50m held by Janus Robberts for nearly 20 years with a 20.66m heave with the 6kg junior shot. Later that season, he showed his true potential by winning the Southern Region U-20 Championships in Boksburg with a 21.65m leap. He won the gold medal at the world junior event in Finland less than three months later, throwing 22.07m in the fifth round, beating out American opponent Adrian Piperi by one centimetre.
During the USSA (South African Universities) Championships in Johannesburg in May 2021, he threw a personal best of 21.21 meters to fulfill the qualifying criteria for the postponed 2020 Tokyo Olympics. With the throw, he moved into fourth place all-time in South Africa. “Just being at the Olympics and throwing with those guys will be incredible,” he says. “However, 2024 is my priority, and I intend to win in 2028.”
