Medals can be worn, polished, displayed or stored away. Won legitimately, that precious metal will forever be a symbol of an athlete’s sweat and toil. But for some it is the quest to do something no human has ever done, to improve on perfection, which drives them.
Olympic triple jump champion Christian Taylor has Jonathan Edwards’ magnificent 18.29m leap in his sights. The American’s best is 23cm short of the Briton’s feat. It is a small step for a man, but a gap which leaves a history-chasing triple jumper with, Taylor says, “quite a bit of work to do”.
“The world record has been on my mind since I got into the triple jump,” the 25-year-old Georgia native said. “It would be mind-blowing to break the record. I’m very passionate about it.
“To get the world record that, to me, is the signatory that you’re the best of all time. To say you are the greatest jumper in the world… I don’t know if there’s a word for that.
“It’s something I’m chasing every day. It’s going to take the perfect atmosphere, all the variables coming together, but to say this could be the year – that’s what I’m hoping for.”
