Tia Hellebaut after her upset victory in the high jump in Gothenburg (© Getty Images)
There were no shortage of emotions flowing through newly-minted European High Jump champion Tia Hellebaut just after her stunning upset victory before a packed house in Ullevi Stadium last night (11).
One, surprisingly enough, was empathy for a fellow competitor she’s looked up to for years.
It’s been a crazy evening and I still can’t believe that I won,” the 28-year-old Belgian said. “But I also feel a little bit sorry for Kajsa because I took her gold medal.”
The gold medal wasn’t “her’s” per se, but it was easy to understand where Hellebaut was coming from. Displaying strong form in the lead-up to Gothenburg, World champion Kajsa Bergqvist was heavily favoured here, and her third place finish left the capacity crowd stunned as it left the stadium.
“It’s in Sweden,” Hellebaut said, “it’s been maybe two years now that people have been talking about Kajsa getting the gold here. I think it was maybe big pressure for her. I feel sad. I remember in 2000, watching all the big competitions. I woke up in the middle of the night to watch her jump at the Olympics. It feels a bit strange. I have a lot of respect for her.”
Admiration and reverence aside, Hellebaut proved herself as an admirable champion, capping a remarkably consistent season, her first solely as a high jumper, with a pair of national records in the deepest competition ever to snatch the title from the Swede.
“I wasn’t thinking about medals,” Hellebaut admitted. “I was thinking about jumping a national record. It’s a good way of thinking before a competition.” After a string of national records this summer, she brought a personal best of 2.00m to Gothenburg, and added a centimetre on her second attempt at 2.01.
“And when I jumped 2.01, I thought, ‘Ok, I had a really good championship.’ But I didn’t expect 2.03.” It was a hefty clearance, and with a solid first effort at 2.05, Hellebaut illustrated that more is one the way but stopped short of any predictions. “I still don’t think I can jump 2.05, but maybe it’s just a mental barrier.” Until Friday evening, the highest bar she had ever attempted was 2.02.
Known primarily as a multi-eventer prior to this season – she was fifth in the Pentathlon at the 2004 World Indoor Championships – Hellebaut decided to focus her attentions solely on the High Jump after the World Championships in Helsinki last summer, where she finished sixth. “But I still had one goal, a national record in the Heptathlon,” she said. That came at Gotzis in May where she tallied 6201 points in what she said was her final seven-eventer. “So I was already thinking about focusing on the high Jump last year. I improved my technique, and I lost some weight, which meant a few centimetres.”
Her new focus reaped quick dividends, last winter, first with 1.96 and 1.97 national records, and a sixth place finish at the World Indoor Championships. Her steady improvement continued outdoors, first with a 1.97 at Gotzis, a 1.98 clearance for second at Oslo’s Bislett Games, and a pair of two metre clearances at both the Paris and Rome IAAF Golden League stops.
“After jumping 1.97 in the winter, I wanted to go up step-by-step. And it’s like every competition I was able to be consistent and steadily improve.”
She already knows that topping her Gothenburg act will be an extremely difficult chore.
"I think I have to get a little sleep to figure out what’s going on," she said. "But “I think it’s going to be very difficult to do this again.”
Bob Ramsak for the IAAF
