Highest Jump Ever: Javier Sotomayor

[00:00:00] On July 29, 1989, at the Central American and Caribbean Championships held in San Juan Puerto Rico Javier Sotomayor did something no human had ever done in recorded history when he jumped eight feet on the high jump, which is a feat that has never been done again in recorded history.

[00:00:23] Here's the story behind, Javier and Javier achieved this epic moment to Dave on Daily Sports History. Welcome to Dave's Sports History, I'm Ethan Reese, your guide to a rapid deep dive in this sports history every day. And today's trivia question to listen out for is why did Javier

[00:00:46] not compete in the Olympics till 1992? Now the high jump is a very unique competition, as over the years there's been so many different techniques on the what's the best way to do a high jump

[00:01:01] to you go over with one leg at a time, do you just jump and top over head first? And it wasn't until 1968 when we first started to jump what we see today as the Fossberry's flop where Dick

[00:01:13] Fossberry of Oregon jumped going over his back and has proved to be the best way for us to show how high we can actually jump, which is the story behind that deserves its own full episode. But

[00:01:25] today we're going to focus on the greatest high jumper to ever live in Javier Soto Mayor. As Javier was born in Cuba to a relatively poor area, as his father worked in as a sugar factory

[00:01:38] maintenance man and his mother was a daycare worker. But Javier showed him to have great athletic ability and was actually spotted playing basketball when he was 14 by some track coaches.

[00:01:50] When he jumped for the ball in his head on the rim and the coaches convinced him to try to compete in high jump as it didn't require the skill that basketball did with their hands. You just

[00:02:01] needed to use that God given skill of jumping that he already had and at that point he already had a vertical of 43 inches without any formal training and by his in 1983 his first year even trying

[00:02:16] to high jump he had already cleared two meters which is over six and a half feet in his best jump that first year was 2.15 meters which is over seven feet and on May 19th 1984

[00:02:31] he set the junior world record at 2.33 meters which is seven feet seven and a half inches which is a junior record that is still active to this day and would have been good enough

[00:02:46] to make the podium at the 1984 Olympics although he was not able to compete as Cuba was boycotting the 1984 Olympics who do it being held in Los Angeles as retaliation for the United States and

[00:03:00] other countries boycotting the Olympics in 1980 that were held in Moscow but that didn't stop him from he continued to improve his personal best in on September 8th 1988 and a meet held in Spain

[00:03:13] just four days before the opening ceremony of the tooth of the 1988 Olympic Games he set a world record jumping 2.43 meters which is seven feet 11 and a half inches and despite being the best

[00:03:28] jumper in the world at the time again Cuba boycotting the sole Olympics so he was not able to compete so two times he was denied the chance to win an Olympic medal that he very likely would have

[00:03:40] won due to his country's politics but his drive was more of an inward drive as he continued to jump more and more as he wanted to better himself and on July 29th 1989 at the Central America and

[00:03:54] Caribbean championships in San Juan Puerto Rico he did something no one had ever done before when he jumped 2.44 meters which is eight feet which is the average height of a ceiling in the average house in America and no person in recorded history has ever done this feet before

[00:04:15] or since but he wasn't done and despite the following year 1990 him having issues with his knees and heels and being in and out of competitions but he came back in 1991 to continue his dominance

[00:04:28] and was able to make it to the 1992 Olympics in Barcelona his very first Olympic facing against the best competition in the world and with the bar set at 2.35 meters and all of their competitors

[00:04:42] missing including himself when he missed two times and on his final attempt was able to pass the bar giving him his very first gold medal at 2.35 meters or seven feet nine and a quarter inch

[00:04:57] but in 1993 he came back at the world indoor championships he was able to break his own record jumping 2.45 meters or eight feet in a quarter inch which is the current world record and the

[00:05:12] fifth longest world record that has not been broken in track and field history in 1996 at the Atlanta Olympics despite struggling with nagging injuries he tried to defend his title but sadly

[00:05:25] was not able to make even the podium as he qualified for the finals but was only able to finish in 11th place following this he underwent surgery to heal his knee and heel injuries and

[00:05:38] skipped the 1997 season to rehab and came back strong and then at the 1999 pan Am a games something I or won the Olympic gold medal but just a few days after that the game's officials announced

[00:05:52] that his year in had tested positive for drugs in cocaine and he was stripped of his metal and sent back to Cuba in disgrace and at the time doping was ramped in the Olympic athletics we

[00:06:04] often remember Canadian sprinter Ben Johnson who was stripped his gold medal at the 1988 sole Olympics for winning the 100 meter dash although something I or via me Lee denied that he had

[00:06:16] done any drugs and he was a huge anti drug promoter but despite everything he was banned for two years although his suspension was cut in half and he was able to compete at the age of 32 after

[00:06:29] the Olympic games it's Sydney being one of the oldest competitors in his events and despite the finals being rainy and windy he was still able to jump he was able to jump 2.32 meters which is good enough for silver medal just behind Russians Sergei Klinging and shortly after this

[00:06:47] Havier St. Montmartre mayor the greatest high jumper in history retired from jumping although part of his retirement was due to him actually testing positive again for an anabolic steroid and to avoid a lifetime ban for having a second positive test he instead retired although Havier

[00:07:04] something my ord still claims innocence in both these tests and even the president of Cuba at the time for Del Castro said that the Cuban American mafia had set him up to bring down the Cuban community

[00:07:17] as he was the greatest Cuban athlete at the time although something my ord claims that a Achilles tinnit injury was the reason why he actually retired either way it was close to the

[00:07:27] end of his career it was a good time for him to sell out this murky area he was entering in whether entries mafia steroids who knows he still is one of the greatest jumpers to ever live

[00:07:38] in his highest vertical jump was measured to be 49 inches which is still among the highest of all time and he still has the record for the three highest high jumps of all time and that one person

[00:07:50] has ever jumped over eight feet besides Havier Santamayor it's great company to be in as he is the only one in the world and it would have been great to see how many medals he could have won if he was

[00:08:02] just allowed to compete outside of all the political unrest during the 1980s. If you like this story please let us know leave us a rating or review wherever you're listening and you can even

[00:08:13] leave us a comment saying a topic you would love us to cover and leave us your name so we can get that done just for you and come back tomorrow for more day these board history and did you catch the answer

[00:08:26] to today's trivia question why did Havier Santamayor not compete in the Olympics till 1992 at Barcelona and the answer was due to a cube of politics not wanting to support the anti communist countries of America and South Korea at the 1984 Los Angeles Games in the 1988 Soul Games