Isinbayeva on cloud nine after record leap

Yelena Isinbayeva was ecstatic after setting her 22nd world pole vault record in last night’s IAAF Golden League meeting in Rome.

Isinbayeva soared over the bar at 5.03metres, two centimetres above the height she achieved to win the 2005 World Championship gold medal in Helsinki.

It was the 12th outdoor record for the 26-year-old Russian – she has recorded 10 indoor records – as she finally bettered her three-year-old mark after a number of near misses.

Isinbayeva, who claimed the record on her second attempt, said the feat was a result of mastering a new technique.

“Today I feel happy inside – so, so happy,” she said. “Today I feel like the previous Isinbayeva.

“Before I was full of problems, but after changes in my technique, my personal life, my coach, my life generally, I think I am stronger now in my personal condition.

“I run faster, I long jump longer, but more important, inside I feel so happy, so calm.”

Isinbayeva will now compete in Stockholm, London and Monaco and then train with the Swedish national team in Japan before the defence of her Olympic gold medal in Beijing.

She admitted that the emergence of American Jenn Stuczynski, who jumped 4.92m at the US Olympic trials on July 6 to emerge as a challenger to her long-time dominance, had driven her to train even harder to retain her world number one status.

“When Stuczynski jumped 4.90 then 4.92 it made me so angry because everyone started to say ’Isinbayeva is finished, we have a new star’,” the Russian added.

“It made me angry and I am happy for that feeling because I didn’t feel it enough since my last world record.

“Today I was so happy with my jumping because before I was looking on TV and my technique was terrible. But today I loved myself so much.”

Isinbayeva is now determined to uphold a challenge she made to Sergey Bubka, the legendary men‘s pole vault record holder, and better his figure of 35 world records.

Isinbayeva, inspired by how easily she cleared her new height, said: “You saw I was not near at the bar, I was higher.

“My goal is to jump 36 world records.”