Yekaterina Koneva has revealed she is going to the European Athletics Indoor Championships in Prague in a year where she is determined to achieve a personal triple jump landmark.
Russian Koneva has her sights set on 15 metres in a career which has been sprinkled with gold and silver medals and she has already started 2015 in style.
Koneva ended last winter as joint top in the world indoor rankings with Ukraine’s Olha Saladukha on 14.65m, but last weekend she soared to a personal best of 14.68m to show the level of early performance she is aiming towards.
Koneva is the WL in TJ with 14.68m, but this Sunday she will compete in LJ at @RusWinter_eng in Moscow
— Cheboksary 2015 (@Euro_Team) January 27, 2015
She has already jumped 14.89m outdoors and said:
I know that the 15m mark is accessible for me. I must be more self-reliant and in competitions, do everything I work through in training. I have been ready to jump over 15m, but there was always something I was holding back. I hope that this season all constraints step aside and I will be more relaxed. I want to be more confident.
Koneva, 26, won the world indoor title 11 months ago in Sopot and finished second at the Zurich European Athletics Championships in August.
Koneva was beaten to gold by just four centimetres in Zurich as Saladukha retained her title with 14.73m and the Ukrainian is the defending European Athletics indoor champion.
Breaking 15m is a big step, with only eight women achieving that target indoors. Koneva’s fellow Russian Tatyana Lebedeva leads the way with the world record of 15.36m from Budapest in 2004 with the next best being Great Britain’s Ashia Hansen who broke the record when she won gold with 15.16m at the European Athletics Indoor Championships in Valencia back in 1998.
Infact, of the eight women, the only two to reach the barrier more than once are Hansen, who also cleared 15.02m and 15.01m, and Lebedeva, with 15.00m.
Outdoors it has been broken more often and after training in Sochi in October and November, it seems Koneva’s preparations are bang on course for a title in Prague - and what a story it would be if she hits 15 metres in the process.