This 2024 marks a century of Philippine participation in the Olympic Games. Ironically, the first time the country sent athletes to the Olympiad in 1924, Paris, France was also the host city. It took almost a month for that first contingent of Filipino athletes to travel from Manila to Paris a century ago.
It would take 97 years before a Filipino would finally win Olympic gold. In the century since that first Paris Olympiad, a new generation of Filipinos has been training and preparing their minds and bodies in the hopes of repeating what weightlifter Hidilyn Diaz accomplished at the Tokyo Olympics. One of them is Ernest John (“EJ”) Obiena , the Tondo-born pole vaulter who has dominated the sport in recent seasons.
What has not been said already about Obiena? He has dominated Asian competition in recent years and has consistently been ranked #2 globally, as per the World Athletics Organization. Since his participation in the 2020 Tokyo Olympics, he’s seen a flurry of gold medals, including setting the new Asian record of six meters. Marking a golden age for his chosen discipline of pole vaulting, his achievements position him as a formidable contender in global athletics, making his pursuit of gold at the Paris Olympics.
His main competition also happens to be a friend in Sweden’s Armand Duplantis, whose performance has pushed the bar higher than anyone else in history. He’s broken the men’s pole vault record on eight separate occasions, clearing 6.24 meters at an.