Andy Diaz wins triple jump gold with 18.15m Italian record at European Athletics Championships

Diaz wins with 18.15m on second attempt

Andy Diaz won the European triple jump title at the European Athletics Championships in Birmingham with a jump of 18.15 metres, setting a new Italian record and the world-leading mark for the year. The distance placed him 14 centimetres short of Jonathan Edwards' world record of 18.29m, set on 7 August 1995 in Gothenburg. Diaz, a 30-year-old Cuban-born athlete naturalized Italian who competes for the Fiamme Gialle, opened with a foul before landing the winning jump on his second attempt, overtaking Portugal's Pedro Pichardo by 29 centimetres. His series also included a 17.78m third jump, a passed fourth attempt, and two further fouls.

Pichardo, another Cuban-born jumper competing for Portugal, took silver with 17.76m, his third consecutive continental podium. The 2021 Tokyo Olympic champion had led after the first round before Diaz overtook him. Andrea Dallavalle, also of the Fiamme Gialle, claimed bronze with 17.37m, recorded on his opening jump. His series continued with two fouls, 17.16m, and 16.83m. Frenchman Thomas Gogois reached 17.21m but finished off the podium.

From Havana to Livorno to Birmingham

Diaz left the Cuban delegation at Madrid airport in July 2021 while the team was preparing to travel to the Tokyo Olympics. He settled in Livorno and was taken in by Fabrizio Donato, the former Italian triple jump champion who now coaches him. Donato won European gold in Helsinki in 2012 and is a former Italian record holder in the event. Diaz obtained Italian citizenship in 2023 on the proposal of Interior Minister Matteo Piantedosi, after the procedure was initiated by CONI president Giovanni Malagò. He made his Italian national team debut at the Paris 2024 Olympics, where he won bronze behind two fellow Cuban-born jumpers: Jordan Díaz (competing for Spain) and Pichardo.

After the competition, Diaz reflected on the jump and on his rivalry with Pichardo.

It was a jump I had been looking for for a long time. Getting close to the record was a lot, even though I still have to work. It was a revenge with Pichardo that I carried with me from Tokyo and then from Rome, where he shouted me off the field. Today I was able to take it back.

He also thanked his team and expressed concern for a teammate.

Thanks to my team and my family. This medal is beautiful. We are a good team. I'm sorry for Biasutti, I hope he's okay.

Seven Italian medals in one day

Italy's Ferragosto at the European Championships produced seven medals in a single day, the most the country has ever won in one day of competition at the European Athletics Championships, whose first edition was in Turin in 1936. The previous record was six podiums on 8 June 2024 in Rome. The three golds came from Diaz in the triple jump and from Massimo Stano and Sofia Fiorini in the race walk marathon. Alexandrina Mihai (silver), Francesco Fortunato (silver), and Andrea Cosi (bronze) added three more medals in the half marathon race walk, with Dallavalle's bronze completing the tally.

Relay heartbreak and other finals

The women's 4x100m relay team of Zaynab Dosso, Gloria Hooper, Dalia Kaddari, and Alessia Pavese finished fourth, missing bronze by six hundredths of a second behind Great Britain, Switzerland, and Poland. Yeman Crippa placed fourth in the 10,000m. Before Birmingham, only two Italian men had stood on a European triple jump podium: Donato, who won gold in Helsinki in 2012, and Dallavalle, who took silver in Munich in 2022.