Armand Duplantis: Raising the Bar, One Centimetre at a Time

by YOUxTalks | Aug 16, 2025 | Sports

Armand Duplantis of Sweden won the men’s pole vault final at the 15th Gyulai István Memorial Track and Field Hungarian Grand Prix, clearing a world record height of 6.29 metres at the National Athletics Center in Budapest, Hungary, on Tuesday, August 12, 2025.

In July 1985, Sergey Bubka became the first human to cross the 6-metre mark in pole vault — one of the greatest feats in track and field history. Bubka improved his own world record of 5.94 metres, set in Italy nearly a year earlier, by six centimetres. It was a moment that left the athletics world in awe and marked the last big leap forward in the record books.

Bubka later raised the mark gradually, going from 6.01 metres to 6.03, then 6.05, and eventually breaking the world record one centimetre at a time. At the time, outdoor and indoor records were counted separately. Behind this centimetre-by-centimetre approach was a sponsorship deal with Nike, which guaranteed him a bonus every time he broke the record.

Could Bubka have gone higher if he had not stuck to the one-centimetre strategy? Quite possibly. Video evidence shows him clearing the bar with room to spare, suggesting he could have attempted higher jumps right away.

Duplantis follows Bubka’s playbook — and surpasses him

Today’s pole vault superstar, Armand “Mondo” Duplantis, has taken inspiration from Bubka’s method, while surpassing the Ukrainian’s achievements. The Swedish-American phenom broke the world record for the 13th time when he cleared 6.29 metres at the Gyulai István Memorial in Budapest, an improvement of just one centimetre over his June record, which itself had bettered his 6.27m effort in February.

From the first time Duplantis broke the world record in February 2020 with a 6.17m jump, to his 6.29m leap earlier this week, he has consistently raised the bar one centimetre at a time. On many of those record-breaking attempts, his clearance has shown he could have gone higher immediately. But, like Bubka, Duplantis knows another record attempt is always around the corner.

He is also financially shrewd. The 25-year-old earns bonuses from major sponsors Puma and Red Bull each time he breaks a world record. However, the bonuses are not doubled if he sets multiple records at the same competition. In addition, he stands to earn $70,000 for a gold medal at the World Championships, plus a $100,000 bonus from World Athletics if he sets a world record there.

“Got to make a living”

Earlier this year, when asked by former heptathlete Tiara Williams whether he receives a bonus for each world record, Duplantis admitted it was true.

“It is pretty true. I got to make a living, you know. A man’s got to make a living. Somebody has to do it. There is a bit of a glitch or whatever you want to say. I gotta do what I got to do. I see the stuff (talk of him breaking the record by only a centimetre) a little bit, people send it to me. I think that is a good thing. Not so many people I guess are making, like an abundance of bread in track and field. So I guess that is a good thing that I can capitalise on things.”

Despite already winning everything there is to win — two Olympic gold medals, two World Championship titles, two World Indoor titles, and four Diamond League Finals — Duplantis still has the hunger to push his limits.

How high can he go?

In an interview on puma.com after setting the world record of 6.26m in August last year, Duplantis was asked how high he could realistically jump.

“So, we’re at 6.26m right now. It’s crazy because if you had told me this a few years back, it would have been a pinch-me type of thing. But then, when you’re in the situation, you adapt to it and it becomes the new normal. I know what I’m capable of and there’s some more that I can push. I think that 6.30m is probably the target in the near future, and 6.40m is achievable in the next few years.”

At the moment, the sky truly seems to be the limit for Duplantis. He remains far ahead of his rivals. At the Paris Olympics, he won gold with a clearance of 6.25m, the only competitor to cross the six-metre mark. The next best was Sam Kendricks of the USA with 5.95m. Two years earlier at the Budapest World Championships, even while struggling at times, he still outclassed the field. Though he failed to set a record after two misses at 6.23m, he secured gold with 6.10m, ahead of the Philippines’ Ernest John Obiena, who managed 6.00m.

Inspired by family

Duplantis’ journey began at an age when most children were still playing in neighborhood parks. His father, Greg, was a pole vaulter, while his mother, Helena, was a heptathlete. The family even built a pole vault pit in their backyard in Lafayette, Louisiana, where a four-year-old Duplantis first tried the sport that would make him a global icon.

His biggest inspiration, however, was his elder brother Andreas.

“My eldest brother was my biggest inspiration. He was my idol and just watching him grow up and be so much better than me – I just wanted to be like him and follow in my brother’s footsteps. When he was jumping four metres at a time that I was jumping two metres, I just thought that was the most crazy thing and I couldn’t understand how it was possible. It was super-inspirational and I wanted to keep trying to see what I could do in the sport,” Duplantis told World Athletics.

The question now is not if Armand Duplantis will go higher, but how high. For now, he prefers to keep the world guessing — raising the bar one centimetre at a time.