The prosthetic long jumper has twice attempted to compete at the Olympics. He will probably not start a third attempt. His dream has long been a new one. And would be even greater sports history.
Markus Rehm will probably give up his long-standing dream of the Olympics, exhausted. But the prosthetic long jumper now wants to write sports history in a different way: He dreams of being the first person to jump nine meters.
“That would be historical, a magical mark. Like the first marathon under two hours,” said Rehm of the German Press Agency. He recently set the para world record at 8.72 meters. For 14 years no one, not even one with two legs, has jumped further.
Rehm: “The Olympics appealed to me, but never grabbed me”
At the 2021 Summer Olympics in Tokyo, long jump gold went away with 8.41 meters. This also increases resistance to Rehm’s double start, although he only ever wanted to compete in separate classifications at the Olympics. But that he – unlike the now imprisoned stilt sprinter Oscar Pistorius with his semi-final over 400 meters at the 2012 Olympics – dupes the Olympic champion and steals the show, that’s what no official wants.
Rehm has now seen that. And he will almost certainly give up this fight against windmills. “I haven’t quite decided yet,” said the 34-year-old, who is reaching for his sixth World Cup gold in a row in Paris on Friday, the French national holiday: “But I have to honestly say: the Olympics appealed to me, but never packed. It was about showing my sport. And I think today: If you jump really, really far, you can do it without being an Olympian.”
Rehm had already tried to start at the Olympics twice. Before the 2016 games in Rio, he was stopped by the world athletics association, before the Tokyo games he failed with an application to the International Sports Court Cas. Rehm’s trainer Steffi Nerius doesn’t expect him to make another attempt towards the Olympics either. “He always had little support. And I can understand that he no longer feels like pulling alone in front of the Cas,” said the former javelin world champion of the dpa.
Nerius trusts Rehm to do nine meters
The new dream is now: nine meters. “It’s unlikely. But a few years ago I also thought eight meters was hard. And 8.50 meters was almost impossible. Now I’m 8.72 meters. And you have to dream, otherwise you wouldn’t be a competitive athlete,” said the four-time Paralympic champion: “I’m already in the top 10 of the best jumpers. There are only eight people with legs in front of me. The Olympic world record is 8.95 meters. The best jump with wind was 8.99 meters. The nine has no one’s standing there yet. That’s a street number. But you have to allow yourself not to think that’s absurd.”
Nerius credits him with that. “I think he can do it,” she said, “but I don’t want to put too much pressure on him. And nobody should expect it to happen tomorrow. Everything has to fit at a certain moment. When everything comes together , maybe you will be able to do it once. And then it will be difficult to repeat it.”
It was the youngest world record almost three weeks ago in Rhede that gave both the confidence that the historic leap is possible. “I didn’t count on it that day,” said Rehm: “I thought beforehand whether I should do the competition at all, and I slept very badly the night before.” He was all the more astonished when Nerius showed him that he had given away a few centimeters when landing. “And it wasn’t just two or three,” said Rehm: “You think: if the conditions are a little better and I’m even better, hey, then maybe it can happen.”
That also drives him to keep going at almost 35. “At the moment I have the feeling that there is still something in it and I want to know how far it goes,” he said: “If I realize that I’ve reached the limit, it’s totally okay to stop.” And if that’s the nine meters? “Then I don’t care what comes after that,” he said. Then he would have written sports history.
Source: Stern
I am Pierce Boyd, a driven and ambitious professional working in the news industry. I have been writing for 24 Hours Worlds for over five years, specializing in sports section coverage. During my tenure at the publication, I have built an impressive portfolio of articles that has earned me a reputation as an experienced journalist and content creator.
