Greek women's pole vault streak continues

Thanks to Ekaterini Stefanidi’s bronze medal at the 2019 World Athletics Championships, Greece has now won at least one medal in the women’s pole vault at each of the last 12 major international competitions.

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At the 2012 European Championships in Helsinki, Greece’s Nikoleta Kyriakopoulou made history. She won bronze to become the country’s first female pole vaulter to ever win a medal in a major competition at the senior level. It was not until two years later, at the 2014 European Championships in Zurich, that Greece would win another medal in the event. Then, it was Ekaterini Stefanidi, a former world youth champion.

Since then, Greece has won a medal in the women’s pole vault at each and every major competition. Stefanidi has won most of them, having won five gold medals, two silver medals, and three bronze medals. Kyriakopoulou has also contributed to this feat, winning one silver medal and three bronze medals.

Despite having won a medal in each of the last 12 major competitions combined, the two Greeks have only reached the podium together once. That was at last year’s European Championships in Berlin, where Stefanidi won gold and Kyriakopoulou won silver. The Greek duo has come close to doing so on two other occasions. At the 2016 European Championships in Amsterdam, Stefanidi won gold while Kyriakopoulou finished fourth. This year at the European Indoor Championships in Glasgow, Kyriakopoulou won bronze while Stefanidi finished fourth.

The next major athletics competition will be the 2020 World Indoor Championships in Nanjing, China. There, Kyriakopoulou and Stefanidi will look to extend this streak to 13 consecutive major competitions. If you include the men’s pole vault in this statistic, Greece has already won a medal in each of the last 13 major competitions, as Konstantinos Filippidis won gold at the 2014 World Indoor Championships (as well as silver at the 2017 European Indoor Championships).

FULL LIST OF GREEK MEDALISTS IN THE WOMEN’S POLE VAULT SINCE 2014:

2014 European Championships-Ekaterini Stefanidi (Silver)

2015 European Indoor Championships-Ekaterini Stefanidi (Silver)

2015 World Championships-Nikoleta Kyriakopoulou (Bronze)

2016 World Indoor Championships-Ekaterini Stefanidi (Bronze)

2016 European Championships-Ekaterini Stefanidi (Gold)

2016 Olympic Games-Ekaterini Stefanidi (Gold)

2017 European Indoor Championships-Ekaterini Stefanidi (Gold)

2017 World Championships-Ekaterini Stefanidi (Gold)

2018 World Indoor Championships-Ekaterini Stefanidi (Bronze)

2018 European Championships-Ekaterini Stefanidi (Gold)

2018 European Championships-Nikoleta Kyriakopoulou (Silver)

2019 European Indoor Championships-Nikoleta Kyriakopoulou (Bronze)

2019 World Championships-Ekaterini Stefanidi (Bronze)

by Andrew Stamas

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