Mahuchikh Named First Ultimate High Jump Champion

Yaroslava Mahuchikh cleared 1.99m to win the women's high jump at the inaugural World Athletics Ultimate Championship in Budapest. The Ukrainian became the event's first Ultimate champion on Friday evening.

1.95m decided it, 1.99m sealed it

The night turned on the bar at 1.95m at the Gyula Zsivotzky National Athletics Centre. One by one, Iryna Gerashchenko, Angelina Topić and Eleanor Patterson missed all three tries. Only Nicola Olyslagers cleared it, on her final attempt.

That left Mahuchikh and Olyslagers to settle the win. Mahuchikh opened at 1.91m and cleared her first two heights cleanly. She needed two tries at 1.99m, and when Olyslagers could not answer, the trophy was hers.

On a cold evening she went back to her sleeping bag as champion. She then took three attempts at 2.04m, a height that would have added a centimetre to her own world lead. She could not clear it, but it no longer mattered.

A trophy for the world record-holder's collection

Olyslagers took second on 1.95m, and Patterson and Topić shared third on 1.91m. The win added to Mahuchikh's 2023 world title, her 2024 Olympic crown and two world indoor golds. She also holds the world record of 2.10m, set in Paris in July 2024.

"I am so proud to be in the history of world athletics," she told reporters afterwards. "This is the first Ultimate Championship and I am the first Ultimate champion – I am so happy."

Her name now opens the record of a new event. It is one more title in a career already full of them.