By KRISTEL SATUMBAGA
EJ Obiena came up short in his campaign at the 63rd Ostrava Golden Spike after landing in seventh place behind eventual champion and world No. 1 Armand “Mondo” Duplantis on Tuesday, May 28 (early Monday in Manila).
The world No. 2 pole vaulter only managed to clear his opening bar at 5.52 meters at the Mestsky Stadium in Czech Republic where he also broke his pole mid-competition.
He passed 5.62m and went directly to 5.72m where he was unsuccessful in his two tries before taking his final attempt at 5.82m to no avail.
Duplantis captured the gold medal with a 6.00m performance and even attempted to break his one-month-old world record of 6.24m but failed.
France’s Ethan Cormont bagged the silver while Ben Broeders of Belgium pocketed the bronze via countback after the two vaulters posted identical 5.62m along with hometown bet David Holy, Poland’s Robert Sobera and Frenchman Anthony Ammirati.
Obiena’s struggles, however, started as early as last week where he had trouble bringing his poles from California, where he has been training, to Europe.
He narrated that he started to ship his poles as early as May 19, but his poles were not accepted due to full cargo space on the flight. He made several attempts until the poles arrived a week later on Sunday, May 26, but not before spending a whole day locating the poles after he was told that the equipment couldn’t be located at the departure airport.
“Frustrating to say the least and very pissed at the whole debacle. Taking what positive I can take on this whole situation and thankfully it seems like I am in one piece,” said Obiena.
Obiena hopes to leave the experience behind as he set his goals on the Bislett Games Wanda Diamond League in Oslo, Norway on Thursday, May 30, where he will be up against a tougher field composed mostly of Olympians who competed in the 2020 Tokyo edition.
Comprising the field are France’s Thibaut Collet, Greece’s Emmanouil Karalis, Netherlands’ Menno Vloon, Germany’s Bo Kanda Lita Baehre, hometown bet Simen Guttormsen, Tokyo silver medalist Chris Nilsen, and Americans Sam Kendricks and KC Lightfoot.
