2023-08-20 09:05:06
Just Kwaou-Mathey after the men’s 60m hurdles final, during the European Indoor Athletics Championships, at the Atakoy Athletics Arena in Istanbul, March 5, 2023. OZAN KOSE / AFP
A French hurdler can always hide another. We were expecting the hatching of Sasha Zhoya, the announced champion of the 110m hurdles, but it was a virtual stranger, Just Kwaou-Mathey, who revealed himself last year. He confirms, since the beginning of this season, that he has put his fledgling career on the right track. In August 2022 at the World Athletics Championships in Eugene (Oregon), the resident of the Evreux club achieved the best performance of the tricolor camp: semi-finalist in 13 s 25, failing in one breath to reach the final, first of the not qualified at the time. A few days later, he consoled himself by snatching a promising European bronze in Munich, behind his compatriot, the experienced Pascal Martinot-Lagarde, 31, and the Spaniard Asier Martinez.
A year later, Pascal Martinot-Lagarde failed to validate his ticket for the world championships, which take place in Budapest until August 27. But with Sasha Zhoya, 21, Wilhem Belocian, 28, and Just Kwaou-Mathey, 23, the succession seems assured. In July, the trio was invited, in this order, to the podium of the French championships in Albi and, while the 110m hurdles series start on Sunday August 20 at 1:05 p.m., each represents a good chance of a tricolor medal. on the banks of the Danube.
Starting, therefore, with Just Kwaou-Mathey. In March, during the world indoor championships in Istanbul, he won a second continental charm, finishing 3rd in the 60m hurdles in 7s 59. Above all, the Norman hurdler runs faster every year. In 2023, he improved his personal records indoors and outdoors: 7s 52 over 60m hurdles, at Aubière (Puy-de-Dôme) in February, and 13s 09 over 110m hurdles, in June, during the meeting of the Diamond League at the Charléty stadium. He won second place in the final behind the untouchable American Grant Holloway and his 12 s 98.
” Serial [13 s 25]he broke ten yards before the line [avancer son buste sur la ligne pour gagner un peu de temps]. I told him: “Run as if there was an eleventh hurdle because you break way too early and you leave a tenth”., says his trainer, Fabien Lambolez. With this time, he improves his personal best, established in 2022, by more than 15 hundredths, and becomes the fourth fastest tricolor hurdler in history; only Pascal Martinot-Lagarde (12 s 95), Ladji Doucouré (12 s 97) and Wilhem Belocian (13 s 07) did better. World record holder among juniors (with hurdles of 0.99 meters against 1.06 meters in elite), Sasha Zhoya is currently only in 7th place in this ranking. His time of 13 s 01 in the final at Albi was not approved because of too favorable a wind.
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