World Athletics Championships in Budapest: the Chengdu heroes were tired

No less than 2100 athletes from 195 countries competed for the 2023 World Athletics Championships held from 19-27 August in the Hungarian capital. Among them 28 had won a medal at the Chengdu FISU Games which ended shortly before, on 8 August. However, the Chengdu heroes failed to repeat their feats despite a few good performances.

Swiss pole vault star Angelica Moser (picture above) was the most prominent one as she reached the world’s top 5 in her discipline with a clearance at 4.75m, her personal best outdoors. In China, a bar passed at 4.62m had been enough for gold.

The Chengdu Javelin Men gold medallist Edis Matulevicius (left picture) qualified for the Budapest final, finishing eighth while Elena Kulichenko (CYP), silver medallist in the Women High Jump, also reached the final in Hungary where she achieved her personal best with a 1.92m clearance (thirteenth rank). And Jiayuan Song (CHN), who earned gold in the Women Shot put, finished eleventh in the Budapest final.

Elsewhere, men triple jumpers Wen Su (CHN, gold in Chengdu) and Necati Er (TUR, silver) both landed at 16.59 in the qualifications but this did not open the doors to the final.

Australian Cara Feain-Ryan finished seventh in her Women Steeplechase semi-final which was not enough for the final despite a personal best time of 9:29.60. She had run in 9:46.02 to claim gold in China.

Chengdu bronze medallist Zhyiu Xie (CHN) reached the Men 400m hurdles semi-finals but for Patrizia Van der Weken (Women 100m), who won Luxembourg’s first gold medal in the history of the FISU Games, Budapest was a short story which ended in the heats. Early exit was unfortunately also the fate of the other Chengdu medallists who participated in these World Championships.

Written by Olivier van Bogaert