Yelena Isinbayeva

Yelena Gadzhievna Isinbayeva (Елена Гаджиевна Исинбаева; born 3 June 1982) is a Russian former pole vaulter.

First in Lausanne, Switzerland, she added an extra centimetre to her own mark clearing 4.93 m. It was the 14th world record of Isinbayeva's career coming just three months after she broke her own indoor mark (4.89 m) in Lievin.

Eleven days later, in Madrid, Spain, she added an additional 2 cm to clear 4.95 m. In Crystal Palace, London on 22 July, after improving the record to 4.96 m, she raised the bar to 5.00 m. She then became the first woman in history to clear the once mythical five-metre barrier in pole vaulting, achieving the monumental mark with a single attempt.

Six months after having taken up pole-vaulting she won her first major victory at age 16 during the 1998 World Youth Games in Moscow, Russia with a height of 4.00 m. It was her third athletic competition.

She jumped the same height at the 1998 World Junior Championships in Athletics in Annecy, France, but this left her 10 cm away from the medal placings.

In 1999, Isinbayeva improved on this height at the 1999 World Youth Championships in Athletics in Bydgoszcz, Poland when she cleared 4.10 m to take her second gold medal.

At the 2000 World Junior Championships in Athletics Isinbayeva again took first place clearing 4.20 m ahead of German Annika Becker.

The same year the women's pole vault made its debut as an Olympic event in Sydney, Australia where Stacy Dragila of the United States took gold.

In the same event Isinbayeva did not make it out of the qualifying round.

She won another gold medal in 2001, this time at the European Junior Championships with a winning height of 4.40 m.

Isinbayeva continued to improve and 2002 saw her clear 4.55 m at the 2002 European Athletics Championships, where she gained her first senior championship medal (silver), finishing 5 cm short of her compatriot Svetlana Feofanova.

2003 was another year of progression and saw Isinbayeva win the European Under 23 Championships gold with 4.65 m (in Bydgoszcz).

On 13 July 2003, just about a month after her 21st birthday, Isinbayeva set her first world record at a meeting in Gateshead, England with a height of 4.82 m, which had made her the favourite to take gold at the 2003 World Championships in Athletics the following month.

She ended up winning the bronze medal with Feofanova taking gold and Becker the silver.

At a meeting at Donetsk, Ukraine, Isinbayeva set a new indoor world record, with a height of 4.83 m only to see Feofanova increase this by two centimetres the following week.

The following month at the Worlds Indoor Championships in March Isinbayeva broke Feofanova's record with a gold medal-winning jump of 4.86 m beating reigning indoor & outdoor champion Feofanova into bronze with reigning Olympic champion Dragila taking silver.

The IAAF considered all three records to be over-all (outdoor) records, hence the indoor and outdoor records now stood at 4.86 m

27 June saw Isinbayeva return to Gateshead and improved the world record to 4.87 m. Feofanova responded the following week by breaking the record by a centimetre in Heraklion, Greece.

On 25 July in Birmingham, England, Isinbayeva reclaimed the record jumping 4.89 m and five days later in Crystal Palace, London, added a further centimetre to the record.

She is a two-time Olympic gold medalist (2004 and 2008), a three-time World Champion (2005, 2007, and 2013), the world record holder in the event, and is widely considered the greatest female pole-vaulter of all time.

Isinbayeva was named Female Athlete of the Year by the IAAF in 2004, 2005 and 2008, and World Sportswoman of the Year by Laureus in 2007 and 2009.

At the 2004 Summer Olympics in Athens, Isinbayeva won gold medal with a new world record height of 4.91 m. She subsequently broke the record later that year at the Memorial Van Damme in Brussels with a 4.92 m jump, her eighth world record of the season.

Isinbayeva was named World Athlete of the Year for winning the Olympic & World Indoor title and breaking the World record eight times.

She became the first woman to clear the five-metre barrier in 2005.

At the European Indoor Championships in Madrid, Spain Isinbayeva won gold with a new indoor world record of 4.90 m. In July 2005, Isinbayeva broke the world record four times over three separate meetings.

After the women's pole vault final at the 2005 World Championships in Helsinki, Finland was delayed due to extremely bad weather conditions, Isinbayeva once again broke her own world record, performing 5.01 m in her second attempt, and winning the competition with a 41 cm margin of victory, which was the greatest margin ever obtained in any World or Olympic competition for the event.

She was also the jackpot winner of the IAAF Golden League series in 2007 and 2009.

In 2007 she entered in the FICTS "Hall of Fame" and was awarded with "Excellence Guirlande D'Honneur".

After poor performances at the world championships in 2009 and 2010, she took a year-long break from the sport.

Her existing world record is 5.06 m outdoors, set in Zürich in August 2009.

Her 5.01 m indoors was the world record for just over a year.

The latter was Isinbayeva's twenty-eighth pole vault world record.

She was given the Prince of Asturias Award for Sports in 2009.

She is one of only ten athletes (along with Valerie Adams, Usain Bolt, Veronica Campbell-Brown, Jacques Freitag, Kirani James, Jana Pittman, Dani Samuels, David Storl and Faith Kipyegon) to win world championships at the youth, junior, and senior level of an athletic event.

She is a major in the Russian Armed Forces.

Born to a Tabasaran father and a Russian mother in Volgograd, Isinbayeva trained as a gymnast from the age of 5 to 15.

She ultimately left the sport because, as she grew, she was considered too tall to be competitive in gymnastics, ultimately attaining a height of 1.74 m.

Isinbayeva was banned from the 2016 Rio Olympics after revelations of an extensive state-sponsored doping program in Russia, thus dashing her hopes of a grand retirement after winning the Olympic gold medal.

She retired from athletics in August 2016 after being elected to serve an 8-year term on the IOC's Athletes' Commission.

Isinbayeva has been a major champion on nine occasions (Olympic, World outdoor and indoor champion and European outdoor and indoor champion).