The Women’s Pole Vault in Nanjing 2025: Vive La France!

Women’s Pole Vault

The women’s Pole Vault competition was exciting and frustrating in equal measure. Let’s get two negatives out of the way to start with. It is a long way to China from anywhere, and a March World Indoors does not sit easily with a World outdoors 6 months later. As a result, many of the world’s top athletes have chosen not to travel to Nanjing. The women’s pole vault included the Olympic medalists Nina Kennedy, Katie Moon, and Alysha Newman. Secondly, it was nobody’s fault, but incredibly frustrating, the mechanism for raising the bar broke and took nearly an hour to be repaired. Of course, there was no way of predicting it would take an hour, meaning the athletes were sitting around trying to keep loose without using too much energy.

There were 12 entrants – two from the USA, 2 from New Zealand, and eight Europeans. I haven’t done the math, but the event somehow has a European feel despite the location. The competition started at 4.30. One athlete failed at 4.45 and a further three at 4.60. Only four athletes were successful at 4.70 – this was after the long wait: Molly Caudery, who may or may not be the defending champion*, the three medalists from the European Indoor Championships in Apeldoorn earlier in the month, Marie-Julie Bonnin from France, of Slovenia and Angelica Moser of Switzerland.

In the European Championships, the finishing order had been

1 Moser

2 Sutej

3 Bonnin

In Nanjing, only Marie-Julie Bonnin cleared 4.75, making her the winner. The other medals were decided on countback, with Tina Sutej taking silver and Angelica Moser bronze. Caudery, who needed two attempts to clear 4.70, was squeezed out of the medals.

It was a brilliant performance by Bonnin, who produced the leap of her life for a national record when it mattered. There was undoubted frustration for the other three,  who have cleared 4.75 or more this year. But on the day, Marie-Julie Bonnin was a worthy winner.

Gold medalist  Marie-Julie Bonnin said afterward: “I cannot believe it. It’s like a dream. I felt like I was there for a medal, not the gold. It was tough to jump at the end of March, but I made it. It was hard physically, but I think we chose to come here. At 4.75, I took a pole, stiffer than I’m used to jumping with, and I was like, ‘Ah, I feel it, this is the right pole,’ and I said it to my coach….