Nina Kennedy
Pole Vaulter
Current world #1
The 27-year-old trailblazer is dominating the sport – she is Australia’s best pole-vaulter and the current world #2.
Nina Kennedy soared to new heights at the Paris 2024 Olympics when she became Olympic Champion in the women’s pole vault event with a jump of 4.90m jump. In the process, she would make history becoming the first women in the Australian team to ever win a gold medal in Field Athletics at the Olympics.
Nina was born on April 5, 1997, in Busselton, a city in Western Australia. She began pole vaulting at the age of 12 after she was spotted by a coach at an athletics meet. In just two years, she finished second at the Australian senior pole vault championships after recording a personal best of 4.10m.
She continued to make rapid strides and in February 2015 in Perth, Kennedy raised her personal best three times in one competition. She improved it to 4.43m, then 4.50m and finally achieved a leap of 4.59m – a world junior record.
On her senior debut at the 2015 World Athletics Championships in Beijing, Kennedy no-heighted and suffered the same fate at the World U20 Championships in Poland the following year.
She had to withdraw from the 2017 World Athletics Championships with an injury, but Nina Kennedy had a remarkable year in 2018. She raised her personal best to 4.71m and at the National Championships, she beat New Zealand’s Olympic bronze medallist Eliza McCartney.
Kennedy also won her first senior international medal for Australia after bagging the bronze at the 2018 Commonwealth Games held on home soil. Despite being injured six weeks before the tournament and only having two practice sessions, she finished in third place with a jump of 4.60m.
In contrast, 2019 proved to be a difficult year for Kennedy who struggled with several injuries which in turn, affected her mental health.
As a result, she missed most of 2019 and struggled with depression for being sidelined for such an extended period. But the memory of winning bronze at the 2018 Commonwealth Games in Gold Coast helped motivate her in recovery.
She slowly recovered her form over the course of the 2020-21 season and raised the Australian record to 4.82m at the Sydney Track Classic. However, a spell of injuries and COVID-19 disruptions ruined her positive momentum once again.
Kennedy’s debut Olympic campaign at Tokyo 2020 proved to be a harrowing affair. Having survived a minor COVID-19 scare, she was isolated away from the Olympic village and was also nursing an abductor injury. It took a mental toll and Aussie considered pulling out of the event.
But she fought through the adverse situation and cleared 4.40m but failed her attempts at 4.55m in the qualification round. As a result, she couldn’t make it to the final of the women’s pole vault at Tokyo 2020.
This was followed by wins in the Monaco Diamond League and the final in Zurich with a season-best of 4.81m which made her only the fifth Australian to be crowned Diamond League winner.
Success continued for Nina in 2023, when she became Australia’s first women’s pole vault World Champion.
In a gruelling competition lasting more than two and a half hours on a steamy evening in Budapest, Kennedy twice smashed her own Australian record – with a first-time clearance at 4.85m and a gutsy last-ditch effort at 4.90m.
In both instances, American Katie Moon responded in kind. They then each had three unsuccessful attempts at 4.95m.
Kennedy and Moon could not be separated, an in am amazing show of sportsmanship, both Kennedy and Moon decided to share the title.
On the most successful day in Australian Olympic history, Nina’s heroics etched her name in athletics immortality after winning gold at the Paris 2024 Olympics.
In a packed Stade de France, Kennedy matched her World Championship-winning leap of 4.90m in the final. She did not know it at the time, but it would be the jump that won her gold, beating defending champion Katie Moon, who settled for the silver medal.
Kennedy became the first Australian to win Olympic gold in pole vault since Steven Hooker at the Beijing 2008 Olympics. She also became the first Australian woman in history to to win gold in Field Athletics.
