Maurren Maggi in Belem (© Brazil GP)
Hello again,
I was happy to win the Long Jump at the Brazil Grand Prix meeting in Belem on 4 May, my first Grand Prix competition of the year 2003.
I would have liked to compete abroad before performing in front of my home crowd which is why I agreed to compete in the meeting of Martinique. Unfortunately though, I missed my plane and never made it to Martinique! I really hope I will be able to compete there next year.
Having missed that trip to the Caribbean, I had no choice but to compete in Brazil instead. So on 27 April, I entered both the Long Jump and the Triple Jump in a local competition which took place in Caetano do Sul, near Sao Paulo.
I never imagined I would have done so well. I jumped 6.90m in the Long Jump which is currently the best mark in the world and 14.53m in the Triple Jump which bettered the South American record.
This made me really confident when travelling to Belem, the biggest city in Brazil’s Amazon region. There, I won the Long Jump with a mark of 6.80m. The Long Jump line-up was a very good one and I was up against world class athletes like Concepción Mantaner, Tatyana Ter-Mesrobian and Grace Upshaw.
I believe the Brazil GP meeting is a real feast of Track and Field and deserves to be better known around the world. Over 40,000 people came to the Olympic Stadium to watch the competition. The public in the North of Brazil is very warm and supportive of all athletes, whatever their nationality.
Belem is a very old city with a lot of impressive architecture. I did not have much spare time but nevertheless made a point of visiting several monuments of the colonial era which are currently being restored, such as the Theatre of Peace right in the centre of town
I am back in Sao Paulo now, training hard for my European tour which starts in June.
I will talk to you soon.
Maurren
