Very few athletes travel to an Olympic Games with all their hopes pinned on a silver medal.
It's almost impossible to become an athlete of Olympic standard without possessing the sort of blind self-belief and determination that crystallises gold as the primary ambition to the exclusion of all else.
But there are a small handful of events where, for the vast majority of competitors and due to the other-worldly excellence of one other, silver is the best obtainable result.
Think of anyone racing Katie Ledecky in the 1,500m or Léon Marchand in just about anything at these Games. Their golds are almost marked down before the event begins, and the rest are left to fight over the scraps.
For Australia's Kurtis Marschall, his men's pole vault final was one of those events.
He arrived already in a battle for second, as nobody at these Olympic Games is as far above the rest of the world in their chosen field as Sweden's Armand 'Mondo' Duplantis.
He was not just the favourite, he is by some distance the best in the world and surely the greatest pole vaulter there has ever been.
So long as Duplantis competes to somewhere around 80 per cent of his best ability, none of the next 11 best vaulters can come close.
What an odd position that leaves Marschall in. Ranked the fifth best in the world, he is in the presence of greatness but not realistically able to touch it.
And so the battle for silver unfolded.
A Battle for Silver
The first step for Marschall was to clear a bar at the Olympics, something he was unable to do in Tokyo. His "no-heighter" at his first Olympics stayed with him longer than he would have liked, initially dragging him down but eventually lighting a fire.
Marschall cruised over his first jump of 5.50m, and shed the monkey from his back in the process. Now he was free to compete.
Also firmly in the chase for a glorious silver were American Sam Kendricks, the Philippines' Ernest John Obiena and Greece's Emmanouil Karalis.
They breezed through their first jumps, before Duplantis eventually joined them in action at 5.70. Just warming up, you might say.
The Rise of Mondo Duplantis
How does someone like Duplantis get created? Which lab was he constructed in, this elastic pop star on the end of a giant stick?
It may not surprise you to learn his father was a pole vaulter and his mother a heptathlete. His two older brothers were pole vaulters, as was his younger sister.
At three years old, growing up in LA, Duplantis was able to walk into his backyard and have a crack at a full pole vault set up. If you are a subscriber to the age-old "10,000 hours rule", one would have to imagine that Mondo passed that magical figure long ago.
Duplantis is a Tiger Woods, Williams sisters level of prodigy. At 24-years-old, he is by most measures the most dominant single athlete in the world.
He was born to do this, and has spent the vast majority of life preparing for moments like this one at the Stade de France.
Marschall was a comparative late-comer to the sport, picking it up at age 11 after watching in awe as Steve Hooker won gold in Beijing.
He took to it quickly, but didn't commit fully until he was 16 at which point he gave up playing Aussie rules and went all in on pole vault.
Among Marschall's goals is finally clearing a bar set at 6m high. That 6m mark, he says, is the equivalent of the 10-second barrier for 100m sprinters.
For reference, Duplantis cracked 6m when he was 18-years-old.
Marschall stumbled at 5.80, cleared 5.85, and then worked his way up to an all-or-nothing shot at getting over 5.95. We were in medal territory, and Marschall had no more lives left to use.
It was not to be. The tumbling bar meant Marschall finished sixth, a creditable return and a wiping clean of the slate left dirtied by Tokyo.
Kendricks and Karalis would take the silver and bronze respectively, each celebrating as if they were gold.
But Mondo wasn't done yet.
A Record-Breaking Performance
Duplantis has spent the last four years steadily setting and breaking his own world records. The best eight jumps in history belong to the Swede, and the only thing left to decide in Paris, apart from the silver and bronze medals, was whether Mondo could crack 6.25m and make that nine.
First up, the Olympic record. It had sat at 6.03 for eight years, so Duplantis whacked the bar up to 6.10 and cleared it with room to spare.
There was no need for any more build up.
The bar was set at 6.25, the world record was in play, and the crowd was expectant — at this point it would have come as a surprise if he didn't make history.
His first jump was close, but his trail arm clipped the bar on the way down. The second was less convincing.
Duplantis took his time. The crowd sang and danced and threatened to explode.
By the time he took his position, with Marschall and Kendricks leading the cheer squad just to his left, the collective will of 75,000 people could have lifted him over that bar even if the pole didn't.
Mondo elevated, extended, recoiled and released.
The bar was not so much as brushed, and the roof came off the Stade de France.
There are no limits on what Duplantis's future could hold. His records will surely continue to tumble, and he conceivably could yet have two more Olympic campaigns to come.
He is absurdly marketable, looking so much like actor Jeremy Allen White that it is jarring to see him here, rather than in the kitchen of The Bear swearing at his cousin and perfecting his list of non-negotiables.
He is laser-focused, impossibly cool and beyond talented.
He is going to take this sport to previously unthinkable heights.
Witnessing History
Kurtis Marschall had a front row seat to history. It's not a level he — or maybe anyone — could hope to reach, but he will forever be able to say he threw everything he had at the best there will ever be.
SAINT-DENIS France — Armand “Mondo” Duplantis raised the roof at Stade de France. The stadium may still be shaking.
“Mondo” Duplantis skyrocketed to a new pole vault world record of 6.25m/20-6 on his third and final attempt at just past 10:15 p.m. Paris time. His ninth world record came shortly after he had also soared to a new Olympic record of 6.10m (20 feet).
It was simply a magical and magnificent performance. A gold medal too, his second consecutive, as Sam Kendricks took silver, in the daring, high-flying event, at the Olympic Games Paris 2024.
“It’s hard to understand honestly – if I don’t beat this moment in my career, then I’m pretty ok with that,” Duplantis told Team USA, after the incredible world-record performance. “I don’t think you can get much better with what just happened. It’s dang amazing. I’m a happy man.”
Mondo’s world record attempt was slightly delayed, as Noah Lyles once again darted around the track after receiving his 100-meter gold medal towards the end of the night. Duplantis waited patiently, focused once again, and delivered.
“To jump a world record, you pretty much have to be perfect,” he said. “Honestly, I wanted to be as free as I could. I had nothing to lose. I hit it really good.”
Kendricks was the nearest challenger to the Swedish sensation, vaulting a season-best 5.95m, to win silver and add to his bronze medal from eight years ago, at the Olympic Games Rio 2016.
“This medal was joyous – tonight was lovely, it was everything that I thought an Olympics should be,” a smiling and media-friendly Kendricks said. “The night on the track was special.”
The 24-year-old Swedish-American pole vault superstar astounded, defying gravity, and all sense of what the human body should be able do, launching skyward into the French night on a flexible fiberglass pole, time-after-time, and with ease.
“I hate that we lost him to Sweden, I wish we could get him back to American one of these days,” Kendricks says, half-jokingly, about Duplantis, who grew partially in Louisiana and part-time in Sweden, as a dual citizen.
It seemed like ages prior to his records – his Olympic record on his first attempt, and the world record on number three – that Duplantis locked up his second consecutive Olympic gold medal, after Kendricks bid adieu to the three-hour competition following three unsuccessful attempts at 6.00m.
For the 31-year-old American from Oxford, Mississippi, his silver medal comes eight years after he won his first Olympic medal – a bronze medal at the Olympic Games Rio 2016.
“At the end of the day, I’m on the track, I’m bleeding, and the end of the story is Mondo set the world record, but I snared myself a silver medal along the way,” Kendricks said, showing his hand to reporters, while referring to spiking his hand on his first 6.00m attempt.
Kendricks' stellar performance is redemption, coming three years after he was sent into quarantine after a positive COVID-19 test at Tokyo 2020, forcing the six-time U.S. national champion to miss the Olympic pole vault competition in Japan.
“A great man once told me that you don’t go to the Olympics to win,” Kendricks said. “You go to represent. Team USA, we fight for the privilege just to wear this flag. It’s a hard-fought privilege. Tokyo (2020) hurts.
Kendricks found himself behind eight ball after he missed an awkward-looking first try at 5.85m. As Duplantis and four of his buddies and competitors sailed over the height, the two-time world champion was forced to pass the height and take his chances at 5.90m. He stood in sixth place, with a large hill to climb.
“It’s a risk-based event – you have to kind of guess what is going to happen in the end because your efforts in the beginning make such an impact,” Kendricks explained.
“Making a pass is actually a move I pulled eight years ago in Rio – I missed 5.75m on my first attempt and passed to 5.85m, clearing it on a first because I knew my next jump would be a good one and put me in medal position.”
Lightning strikes twice – and it did in Rio and Paris. The resilient veteran athlete rebounded quickly as the first to clear 5.90m, jumping back into the silver medal position and Mondo passed, not wanting to over exert his energy on an 80-degree Monday evening.
Kendricks, once seemingly down-and-out, then launched a season-best vault of 5.95m. He dashed off the pits, tearing into a sprint, and celebrating euphorically.
“I had to pull off one more Herculean effort at 5.95 to seal the deal and put real pressure on, ‘Mannouli’ because then we had to go to 6, and it’s a real dogfight,” Kendricks said, referring to Greek bronze medalist Emmananouli Karalis.
What a spectacular and memorable night for Mondo, Kendricks, Karalis and the tight-knit fraternity of brothers that fearlessly launch themselves skyward. Sixty-nine thousand fans in Stade de France danced – the joint was jumping as ABBA’s ‘Dancing Queen’ blared throughout, feel-good music from the popular 80’s band from Sweden, an appropriate touch to honor the rock star pole vaulter.
“There were a lot of Swedish flags out there in the stands among the 70,000 – I felt more love and support than I could have ever imagined,” Duplantis said. “I’m going to enjoy the heck out of this one tonight, you don’t have to worry about that.”
As pole vaulters often say ‘the sky is the limit’ – and it certainly was in Paris thanks to Mondo, Kendricks and Karalis. The Duplantis dynasty is alive and well, and it appears most certain that it will only get faster, stronger, and definitely higher.
