Teenager Elizabeth Ndudi smashes 14-year-old Irish long jump record

The 19-year-old Dubliner jumped 6.68m to surpass the 6.62m jumped by Kelly Proper in 2010.

Elizabeth Ndudi.

Rising star Elizabeth Ndudi took another big step forward in her career by smashing the Irish senior women’s long jump record in Illinois on Saturday, the 19-year-old Dubliner jumping 6.68m at the Gary Wieneke Memorial to surpass the 6.62m jumped by Kelly Proper in 2010.

Ndudi, who won gold for Ireland at the European U-20 Championships last summer with an Irish U-20 record of 6.56m, enrolled at the University of Illinois shortly after that win, where she’s coached by Petros Kyprianou. She finished second in the event on Saturday to college teammate Tacoria Humphrey (6.73m).

Ndudi’s chief targets for the outdoor season are the NCAA Championships in Oregon in June and the World U20 Championships in Peru in August, and her jump on Saturday is the longest in the world by an U-20 athlete this year. 

It also means the Olympics in Paris could yet be within reach for the teenager, who was born in Dublin, growing up in Sandyford with a mother who’s half-Irish, half-Dutch and a father who’s Nigerian. 

Ndudi moved to France at the age of 11, developing her talent at Racing Club Nantes, while she still competes domestically for her Irish club, Dundrum South Dublin, winning two national titles in their colours last year.

The automatic Olympic qualifying standard is 6.86m, but Ndudi could potentially earn a place via world rankings if she can rack up a series of performances in the 6.70s before the qualifying window closes at the end of June, though with bonus points crucial in that process, the calibre of competition she’s able to access will prove key once her NCAA commitments are complete.

The automatic qualifying standard for the European Championships in Rome is 6.70m. That event (June 7-12) overlaps with the NCAA Championships (June 5-8) – the focal point of her collegiate campaign – but Ndudi could conceivably compete at both given the first round for the women’s long jump in Rome will not take place until June 11.