Caterine Ibargüen

Caterine Ibargüen is a retired Colombian athlete, born on 12 February 1984, who competed in the high jump, long jump and triple jump. She was born in the Urabá region of Antioquia and raised by her grandmother after her parents separated because of the armed conflict in Colombia. She first played volleyball before a coach steered her to Medellín, where she began training in 1996 under the Cuban coach Jorge Luis Alfaro as a high jumper. Her high jump best of 1.93 m, set in Cali in 2005, remains the Colombian record, and she competed in the high jump at the 2004 Athens Olympics. In the triple jump she won the silver medal at the 2012 Summer Olympics in London with 14.80 m and the gold medal at the 2016 Summer Olympics. She won two World Championships golds, including Moscow in 2013 with 14.85 m, and golds at the 2011 and 2015 Pan American Games. She held the South American triple jump record of 15.31 m from 2014 until 2019, was named IAAF female athlete of the year in 2018, and announced her retirement in August 2021.