Nafissatou "Nafi" Thiam (; born 19 August 1994) is a Belgian athlete specializing in multi-event competition. Thiam is a two-time Olympic gold medalist, winning the heptathlon event at the

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and

2020 Summer Olympics The , officially the and also known as , was an international multi-sport event held from 23 July to 8 August 2021 in Tokyo, Japan, with some preliminary events that began on 21 July. Tokyo was selected as the host city during the 1 ...

. She is the only Belgian athlete, male or female, to successfully defend an Olympic title and only the second woman after

Jackie Joyner-Kersee Jacqueline Joyner-Kersee (born March 3, 1962) is a retired American track and field athlete, ranked among the all-time greatest athletes in the heptathlon as well as long jump. She won three gold, one silver, and two bronze Olympic medals in tho ...

to win back-to-back Olympic titles in the event. She won the gold medals at the

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and 2022 World Championships and

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and

2022 European Championships The 2022 European Championships were the second edition of the European Championships. It was a multi-sport event which took place in Munich, Germany from 11 to 21 August 2022. The tournament began three days after the conclusion of the 2022 Comm ...

as well as the silver medal at the 2019 World Championships. She was voted

IAAF World Athlete of the Year The World Athlete of the Year award is a prize that can be won by athletes participating in events within the sport of athletics organised by World Athletics (formerly named IAAF), including track and field, cross country running, road running, and ...

in 2017. She was a Belgian flag bearer at the opening ceremony of the 2020 Tokyo Olympics. In May 2017, at the

Hypo-Meeting The Hypo-Meeting is an annual athletics (sport), athletics competition that takes place in the Mösle stadium in Götzis in Vorarlberg (Austria) held in the spring (late May, early June). In its history, a total of three world records have been se ...

Götzis Götzis is a town in the western Austrian state of Vorarlberg. The Alpine Rhine valley municipality belongs to the district of Feldkirch. Population Events The town is well known for its annual hypo-combined events meeting, the so-called Hyp ...

Austria Austria, , bar, Östareich officially the Republic of Austria, is a country in the southern part of Central Europe, lying in the Eastern Alps. It is a federation of nine states, one of which is the capital, Vienna, the most populous ...

, she became only the fourth woman to break the heptathlon 7000 point-barrier. As of October 2022, Thiam holds the Belgian records in women's heptathlon, women's javelin and women's

long jump The long jump is a track and field event in which athletes combine speed, strength and agility in an attempt to leap as far as possible from a takeoff point. Along with the triple jump, the two events that measure jumping for distance as a ...

(out and indoor). She set a new world record for the high jump discipline within a women's heptathlon competition in 2019.

Junior career

Nafissatou Thiam was born in

Brussels Brussels (french: Bruxelles or ; nl, Brussel ), officially the Brussels-Capital Region (All text and all but one graphic show the English name as Brussels-Capital Region.) (french: link=no, Région de Bruxelles-Capitale; nl, link=no, Bruss ...

to a Belgian mother and Senegalese father. She started participating in athletics when she was seven years old, winning her first national age group titles in 2009, by which time she was already specializing in the heptathlon. Her favorite athlete at the time was Swedish heptathlete

Carolina Klüft Carolina Evelyn Klüft (; born 2 February 1983) is a retired Swedish track and field athlete who competed in the heptathlon, triple jump, long jump, and pentathlon. She was an Olympic Champion, having won the heptathlon title in 2004. She was al ...

. At the

2011 World Youth Championships in Athletics The 2011 World Youth Championships in Athletics were the seventh edition of the World Youth Championships in Athletics. They were held in Lille Métropole, France, with stadium-based events at Stadium Lille-Métropole in Villeneuve d'Ascq, on 6� ...

Lille Lille ( , ; nl, Rijsel ; pcd, Lile; vls, Rysel) is a city in the northern part of France, in French Flanders. On the river Deûle, near France's border with Belgium, it is the capital of the Hauts-de-France region, the prefecture of the N ...

, France, Thiam finished fourth in the heptathlon with a total of 5366 points. Then, as a first-year junior, she finished 14th at the

2012 World Junior Championships in Athletics The 2012 World Junior Championships in Athletics was an international athletics competition for athletes qualifying as juniors (born 1993 or later) which was held at the Estadi Olímpic Lluís Companys in Barcelona, Catalonia, Spain, on 10–15 ...

in the heptathlon with a total of 5384 points. On 3 February 2013, Thiam broke the junior indoor world record in the pentathlon at a meeting in

Ghent Ghent ( nl, Gent ; french: Gand ; traditional English: Gaunt) is a city and a municipality in the Flemish Region of Belgium. It is the capital and largest city of the East Flanders province, and the third largest in the country, exceeded i ...

with a total of 4558 points, breaking her personal best in 4 of the 5 events.

, who later became Olympic champion and triple world champion, had held the record since 2002 with 4535 points. In doing so Thiam became the first Belgian female athlete to break a world record. However, in March 2013, the record was not ratified due to a lack of anti-doping control on the day it was achieved. The testing took place the next day, which was beyond the deadline specified by the IAAF, athletics' international governing body. On 18 July 2013, Thiam won the gold medal in the heptathlon at the

European Junior Athletics Championships The European Athletics U20 Championships (formerly named the European Athletics Junior Championships up to 2015) are the European championships for athletes who are under-20 athletes, which is the age range recognised by World Athletics as ju ...

, achieving a new Belgian record of 6298 points.

Senior career

2014, she won the bronze medal at the European Championships in Heptathlon. 2015, she won the silver medal at the European Indoor Championships in Pentathlon and at the European U23 Championships in High Jump. On 13 August 2016, Thiam won the gold medal in heptathlon at the

Olympic Games The modern Olympic Games or Olympics (french: link=no, Jeux olympiques) are the leading international sporting events featuring summer and winter sports competitions in which thousands of athletes from around the world participate in a vari ...

in Rio with 6810 points, achieving personal best marks in five of the seven disciplines and defeating reigning Olympic and World Champion

Jessica Ennis-Hill Dame Jessica Ennis-Hill (born 28 January 1986) is a British retired track and field athlete from England, specialising in multi-eventing disciplines and 100 metres hurdles. As a competitor in heptathlon, she is the 2012 Olympic champion, ...

Great Britain and Northern Ireland The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, commonly known as the United Kingdom (UK) or Britain, is a country in Europe, off the north-western coast of the continental mainland. It comprises England, Scotland, Wales and North ...

. She was the youngest Olympic heptathlon gold medalist in history. She was elected Belgian flag bearer at the Olympic closing ceremony. On 3 March 2017, Thiam won the pentathlon at the 2017 European Indoor Championships in Belgrade with a total of 4870 points. On 28 May 2017, Thiam won the heptathlon at the

in Götzis, Austria with a total of 7013 points, again achieving personal best scores in five of the seven disciplines, making her the fourth woman to score 7000 points or higher in competition. As of July 2017, Thiam is third on the all-time list behind

USA The United States of America (U.S.A. or USA), commonly known as the United States (U.S. or US) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It consists of 50 states, a federal district, five major unincorporated territori ...

and

. Her 59.32m

Javelin throw The javelin throw is a track and field event where the javelin, a spear about in length, is thrown. The javelin thrower gains momentum by running within a predetermined area. Javelin throwing is an event of both the men's decathlon and the wom ...

in the

heptathlon in Götzis broke the Belgian record for the women's individual event. On 6 August 2017, Thiam went into the Athletics World Championships in London as hot favorite, winning the heptathlon world title and becoming the first Belgian to win a World Athletics Championships gold medal. On 10 August 2018, she won the gold medal at the

2018 European Championships The 2018 European Championships were the first edition of the European Championships. It was a multi-sport event which took place in Berlin, Germany, and Glasgow, Scotland, United Kingdom (with Edinburgh hosting the diving events and Gleneagles ...

, becoming only the third woman to win Olympic Games, World and European Championships in heptathlon, after

and

. On 27 June 2019, Thiam won the heptathlon competition at the 2019 Decastar in Talence, setting a women's heptathlon high jump world record of 2.02m. On 2 October 2019, Thiam again went into the

World Championships A world championship is generally an international competition open to elite competitors from around the world, representing their nations, and winning such an event will be considered the highest or near highest achievement in the sport, game, ...

as world lead, and favourite for gold, but was expected to face stronger competition than in 2017 from erstwhile rival and 2018 European runner-up, Great Britain's

Katarina Johnson-Thompson Katarina Mary Johnson-Thompson (born 9 January 1993) is an English athlete primarily known as an elite multi-eventer, both as a heptathlete and an indoor pentathlete. She has been World Champion in both disciplines, and a double Commonwealth ...

. In the event, Thiam succumbed to an elbow injury that hindered her javelin, while Johnson-Thompson recorded a huge personal best of 6981 points, a national record and the sixth highest competition score in history to win comfortably. Thiam's performance was still good enough for the silver medal. On 5 March 2021, Thiam won the pentathlon at the 2021 European Indoor Championships in Torun with a total of 4904 points. On 5 August 2021 she won her second gold medal at the Olympic Games with a total of 6791 points. On 18 July 2022 she won her second gold medal at the 2022 World Athletics Championships with a total of 6947 points. Thiam is a member of RFCL Athlétisme, an athletics club operating under the aegis of the Technical and Sports Department of the Royal Football Club de Liège. She was coached by Belgian former decathlete

Roger Lespagnard Roger Lespagnard (born 24 October 1946 in Ougrée, Belgium) is a former Belgian decathlete. Lespagnard competed for his country at the 1968 Summer Olympics in Mexico City, Mexico, where he finished in seventeenth position in the decathlon event ...

for 14 years but she put an end to their collaboration in October 2022. Besides being a professional athlete, Thiam studied

geography Geography (from Greek: , ''geographia''. Combination of Greek words ‘Geo’ (The Earth) and ‘Graphien’ (to describe), literally "earth description") is a field of science devoted to the study of the lands, features, inhabitants, an ...

at the

University of Liège The University of Liège (french: Université de Liège), or ULiège, is a major public university of the French Community of Belgium based in Liège, Wallonia, Belgium. Its official language is French. As of 2020, ULiège is ranked in the 301 ...

. "I like climatology, I like geomorphology – how the earth is shaped by rivers. A lot of subjects, like a heptathlon. Maybe that's why I love it." she said. She graduated from university with a bachelor degree in September 2019. Thiam is a UNICEF Goodwill Ambassador for

UNICEF UNICEF (), originally called the United Nations International Children's Emergency Fund in full, now officially United Nations Children's Fund, is an agency of the United Nations responsible for providing humanitarian and developmental aid to ...

Belgium.

Championship podiums

Olympic Games *2016, heptathlon: outdoor, gold medal (6810 points) *2020, heptathlon: outdoor, gold medal (6791 points) World Championships *2017, heptathlon: outdoor, gold medal (6784 points) *2019, heptathlon: outdoor, silver medal (6677 points) *2022, heptathlon: outdoor, gold medal (6947 points) European Championships *2014, heptathlon: outdoor, bronze medal (6423 points) *2015, pentathlon: indoor, silver medal (4696 points) *2017, pentathlon: indoor, gold medal (4870 points) *2018, heptathlon: outdoor, gold medal (6816 points) *2021, pentathlon: indoor, gold medal (4904 points) *2022, heptathlon: outdoor, gold medal (6628 points) Belgian National Championships *2015, long jump: outdoor, gold medal (6 m 40 cm) *2015, high jump: indoor, gold medal (1 m 85 cm) *2016, long jump: indoor, gold medal (6 m 51 cm) *2016, pentathlon: indoor, gold medal (4678 points) *2017, 60 metres hurdles: indoor, gold medal (8.37 s) *2017, high jump: indoor, gold medal (1 m 90 cm) *2018, long jump: outdoor, gold medal (6 m 60 cm) *2022, long jump: outdoor, gold medal (6 m 63 cm)

Career achievement summary

Personal bests

Honours and awards

* R.F.C.L. Trophy Promising talent: 2010 * Golden Spike award best female talent: 2012 * Golden Spike award: 2013, 2014, 2015, 2016, 2017, 2018, 2019, 2021 * Belgian Promising Talent of the Year: 2013 * Belgian Sportswoman of the Year: 2014, 2016, 2017 * Knight in the : 2014 * European Athletics women's Rising Star of the Year: 2016 * IAAF Female Rising Star of the Year: 2016 * Belgian Sports Merit Award: 2016 * Commander in the Walloon Order of Merit: 2016 *

Forbes ''Forbes'' () is an American business magazine owned by Integrated Whale Media Investments and the Forbes family. Published eight times a year, it features articles on finance, industry, investing, and marketing topics. ''Forbes'' also r ...

30 under 30 for Europe: 2017 * IAAF World Female Athlete of the Year: 2017 In 2017, Thiam officially became

Ambassador.

References

External links

*
Nafissatou Thiam European Athletics profile
{{DEFAULTSORT:Thiam, Nafissatou 1994 births Living people Sportspeople from Liège Belgian heptathletes Belgian female high jumpers Olympic heptathletes Olympic athletes of Belgium Olympic gold medalists for Belgium Olympic gold medalists in athletics (track and field) Athletes (track and field) at the 2016 Summer Olympics Athletes (track and field) at the 2020 Summer Olympics Medalists at the 2016 Summer Olympics Medalists at the 2020 Summer Olympics World Athletics Championships athletes for Belgium World Athletics Championships winners European Athletics Championships winners European Athletics Indoor Championships winners European Athletics Rising Star of the Year winners Belgian people of Senegalese descent Black Belgian sportspeople