Pole vaulter Renaud Lavillenie from Clermont-Ferrand failed to clear 5.82m to qualify for the Paris Olympic Games on Sunday, June 30, 2024. The end of a dream for the athlete.
It’s an Olympic dream that’s gone for Clermontois Renaud Lavillenie. The pole vaulter failed to qualify for the Paris 2024 Games. The athlete had to exceed the 5m82 mark at the French athletics championships in Angers, this Sunday, June 30, 2024, to hope for qualification.
However, the first jumps were promising. The athlete reaches 5m60 on the second attempt, then sets out to exceed 5m72.
It is this last bar that blocks. He fails to get past it three times, signing the end of the Olympic dream.
These 5m72 are however far from the performances of the athlete. Like his record in 2012 at 5m97 or that of 2014, at 6m16.
But in 2023, he underwent tendon surgery, followed by weeks of immobilization and then months of rehabilitation to regain his abilities. It was the start of a race against time to reach qualification for Paris 2024.
Since then, the champion has tried several times to secure the ticket to the Games, such as in Clermont-Ferrand last May, blocking at 5m35, or again in Toulouse in June. Without success.
The athlete will therefore not participate in his fourth Olympiad. As a reminder, Renaud Lavillenie won gold at the London Games in 2012 and silver in 2016 in Rio.
