Three days after Jonathan Edwards’s exploits there was another barrier-breaking world triple jump record in Gothenburg.
Kravets added a phenomenal 41 centimetres to the previous record and became the first woman to triple jump more than 50 feet.
A world record attempt should have been the last thing on Kravets’s mind. The Ukrainian was in trouble after fouling her first two
jumps in the final. The reason for this, she explained afterwards, was that she found the runway so fast that she had increased
the length of her usual runup. She also revealed that a photo of Edwards had provided her with inspiration before her crucial third jump.
Instead of a “safe” jump, Kravets bounded to a world record of 15.50! It gave her the lead by 65 centimetres.
There had only been one legal 15-metre jump outdoors before the Gothenburg final. Afterwards there were five, because besides Kravets,
defending champion Biryukova reached 15.08 in round 3. She was overtaken by Prandzheva, who went out to 15.18 in the fifth and 15.00
in the sixth. Kravets had a long foul in the fourth round and cleared 14.55 with her only other valid effort.