By MARK REY MONTEJO
From the looks of it, the LA Olympics is getting closer for pole vault ace EJ Obiena.
Despite finishing fifth overall in the Diamond League’s Zurich Leg, two-time Olympian EJ Obiena punches his ticket to the 2027 World Athletics Championships after clearing the 5.90-meter mark in Switzerland on Friday, Aug. 28.
The 30-year-old Obiena cleared 5.90 meters on his first attempt before a packed crowd on Swiss soil, a feat that gave him a much-needed morale boost to go higher.
He raised the bar to 6 meters. Sadly, he failed in all three attempts.
Still, the pride of Tondo’s 5.90-meter feat was enough to earn for himself a slot in the biennial meet – which will be hosted by Beijing, China next year – where he once bagged silver and bronze in the 2023 Budapest and 2022 Eugene editions.
It will be his 5th appearance in the talent-loaded world championships.
“5.90m here in Zurich. Thank you @weltklassezurich for always hosting such a wonderful competition. [Para sa bayan],” Obiena wrote.
“PS: With this I also qualified for next year’s World Championship,” he added.
So confident this time was Obiena he sailed over 5.50 and 5.65 meters in one try but took two attempts to clear 5.80 meters.
But that gave him the extra energy needed to vault over 5.90 meters which he last achieved on Aug. 18 in Poland.
There, Obiena bagged his third consecutive gold – eighth for this year – and the first time he delivered a 5.90-meter performance since the 2024 Paris Olympics.
As expected, world No. 1 Armand Duplantis topped the leg with a 6.25-meter outing – another meet record for the Swedish vaulter. He was followed by Greek Emmanouil Karalis (6.20m) and Norwegian Sondre Guttormsen (6.00m) for silver and bronze honors, respectively
Under the tutelage of new coach Marcin Szczepanski of Poland, Obiena is doing all humanly possible to be locked and loaded when he defends his crown in the coming 2026 Asian Games Aichi-Nagoya in Japan next month.
