Caterine Ibargüen Mena ODB (born 12 February 1984) is a retired Colombian

athlete An athlete is most commonly a person who competes in one or more sports involving physical strength, speed, power, or endurance. Sometimes, the word "athlete" is used to refer specifically to sport of athletics competitors, i.e. including track ...

competing in

high jump The high jump is a track and field event in which competitors must jump unaided over a horizontal bar placed at measured heights without dislodging it. In its modern, most-practiced format, a bar is placed between two standards with a crash mat f ...

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 gr ...

and

triple jump The triple jump, sometimes referred to as the hop, step and jump or the hop, skip and jump, is a track and field event, similar to long jump. As a group, the two events are referred to as the "horizontal jumps". The competitor runs down the tr ...

. Her notable achievements include a gold medal at the

2016 Summer Olympics The 2016 Summer Olympics (), officially the Games of the XXXI Olympiad () and officially branded as Rio 2016, were an international multi-sport event held from 5 to 21 August 2016 in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, with preliminary events i ...

, silver medal in the

2012 Summer Olympics The 2012 Summer Olympics, officially the Games of the XXX Olympiad and also known as London 2012, were an international multi-sport event held from 27 July to 12 August 2012 in London, England, United Kingdom. The first event, the ...

, two gold medals in the World Championships in Athletics, and two gold medals in the

2011 Pan American Games The 2011 Pan American Games, officially the XVI Pan American Games () and commonly known as Guadalajara 2011, were an international multi-sport event held from October 14–30, 2011, in Guadalajara, Mexico. Some events were held in the nearby c ...

and

2015 Pan American Games The 2015 Pan American Games (), officially the XVII Pan American Games () and commonly known as the Toronto 2015 Pan-Am Games (Toronto 2015), were a major international multi-sport event celebrated in the tradition of the Pan American Games, ...

Biography

Caterine was born in the Urabá region of Antioquia, where she was raised by her grandmother after her parents separated because of the armed conflict in Colombia. Her father left for Venezuela and her mother moved to

Turbo, Colombia Turbo is a port city in Antioquia Department, Colombia. Part of the Urabá Antioquia sub-region, it is located on the coast of Gulf of Urabá, 340 km north of Medellín (the department capital and second largest city). This port city is the ...

. Caterine first played volleyball, and Wilder Zapata, her coach, noticed her skill and suggested she play in

Medellín Medellín ( ; or ), officially the Special District of Science, Technology and Innovation of Medellín (), is the List of cities in Colombia, second-largest city in Colombia after Bogotá, and the capital of the department of Antioquia Departme ...

, which had the high-profile Atanasio Girardot Sports Complex as a venue for national and international games. There, she began her training in 1996 with the Cuban coach Jorge Luis Alfaro, specializing in the high jump. Her personal best in the high jump is 1.93 metres, achieved on 22 July 2005 in

Cali Santiago de Cali (), or Cali, is the capital of the Valle del Cauca department, and the most populous city in southwest Colombia, with 2,280,522 residents estimate by National Administrative Department of Statistics, DANE in 2023. The city span ...

. This is the current Colombian record. She competed at the 2004 Olympic Games in

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, where she jumped 1.85 m in the qualifying round. She held the South American record in the

with 15.31 m from July 2014 until September 2019. That jump remained the best jump since the Olympics in August 2008 until Yulimar Rojas achieved a mark of 15.41 m at the Jaén Paraíso Interior Meeting. On 1 September 2011, she obtained the bronze medal at the IAAF World Championships in

Daegu Daegu (; ), formerly spelled Taegu and officially Daegu Metropolitan City (), is a city in southeastern South Korea. It is the third-largest urban agglomeration in South Korea after Seoul and Busan; the fourth-largest List of provincial-level ci ...

with a 14.84 m performance. Based in

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. Coached by Ubaldo Duany, former Cuban Long Jumper (8.32 m PB from 1986). On 5 August, she won a silver medal at the London 2012 Olympics in the triple jump competition with a 14.80 m jump on her last attempt. On 15 August 2013, she won IAAF World Championships in

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in the triple jump competition with a 14.85 m jump on her second attempt. Caterine Ibargüen announced retirement in August 2021.

Personal bests

;Outdoor *200 m: 24.96 s (wind: -1.2 m/s) – San Germán, 4 December 2009 *800 m: 2:35.35 min – San Germán, 4 December 2010 *100 m hurdles: 14.09 s (wind: +0.0 m/s) – Mayagüez, 19 February 2011 *High jump: 1.93 m –

, 22 July 2005 *Long jump: 6.93 m (wind: +0.8 m/s) –

Ostrava Ostrava (; ; ) is a city in the north-east of the Czech Republic and the capital of the Moravian-Silesian Region. It has about 283,000 inhabitants. It lies from the border with Poland, at the confluences of four rivers: Oder, Opava (river), Opa ...

, 9 September 2018 *Triple jump: 15.31 m (wind: 0.0 m/s) –

Monaco Monaco, officially the Principality of Monaco, is a Sovereign state, sovereign city-state and European microstates, microstate on the French Riviera a few kilometres west of the Regions of Italy, Italian region of Liguria, in Western Europe, ...

, 18 July 2014 *Shot put: 13.79 m – Carolina, 20 March 2010 *Javelin throw: 37.72 m – San Germán, 4 December 2010 *Heptathlon: 5742 pts – San Germán, 5 December 2009 ;Indoor *High jump: 1.81 m –

, 11 March 2006

International competitions

Honours

*: ** Grand Cross of the National Order of Merit (12 December 2018)

Awards

*2018

IAAF World Athletics, formerly known as the International Amateur Athletic Federation and International Association of Athletics Federations and formerly abbreviated as the IAAF, is the international sports governing body, governing body for the sport ...

Female athlete of the year award

Notes

References

External links