Yes, the Athletics World Championships are going on in Beijing right now. And yes, I’m watching all the competition and all the events like I did in previous edition. However, I decided not to post daily summaries of the action in Beijing like I did for the Swimming World Championships in Kazan earlier this month.

Why? Because I must do some other stuff as well (like writing what can possibly be my first published scientific paper), and with the morning events fucking up my daily schedule because of the time differences I just don’t have the time that is necessary in order to invest the proper amount of effort in all my tasks. If only we had 30 hours in a day… Can someone please do something about it? God? Allah? Buddha? The Flying Spaghetti Monster? Someone? Would it help if we all sign a petition? No? Well, ok then… 24 hours it is…

Believe me, I want to write every day, I wanted to write how I was anxious before the men’s 100m final, keeping all my fingers crossed for Usain, and how I was almost beyond myself when the adorable Jessica Ennis-Hill won the Heptathlon, and how Lavillenie broke my heart and… and… but sadly there is no time for everything! So I apologize. I will however post summaries of the Championships when it’ll end (and may it never end!). That was my original intention. Until something happened today that required me to break that rule (well, aren’t all rules meant to be broken? I mean – don’t talk about fight club? You cannot be serious!).

And this something was Hanna Knyazyeva-Minenko. She looked in great form in the qualifiers, easily managing to qualify for the final with her first jump and leaving more than 20m on the board. And then this awesome triple jumper produced the jump of her lifetime in the final – 14.78m. setting a new PB and a NR, and ultimately winning the silver medal. Silver medal for Israel! AND this result is the 287th best all-time, something that only Aleksandr Averbukh in the pole vault and Konstantin Matusevich in the high jump ever achieved, among the Israeli athletes. AND she lost to the great Ibarguen by only 12 cm! WOW.

Such excitement! This is Israel’s third ever medal in the Athletics World Championships, after Averbukh’s bronze in 1999 and silver in 2001. A huge achievement for Hanna, who brought her A-Game when it counted and beat several much more accomplished jumpers such as Koneva, Saladukha and Rypakova. I am really so so happy for her 🙂 She brought true joy to me as a track & field fan and as an Israeli. Hanna – you’re fucking awesome!

Is the bird she’s holding anatomically correct?