Armand Duplantis facts for kids

Quick facts for kids
Armand Duplantis

Duplantis in 2023
Personal information
Nickname(s)	Mondo, Mondo Duplantis
Nationality	Swedish American
Born	(1999-11-10) 10 November 1999 (age 25) Lafayette, Louisiana, U.S.
Education	Lafayette High School
Height	1.81 m
Sport
Country	Sweden
Sport	Athletics
Event(s)	Pole vault
College team	Louisiana State University
Club	Upsala IF
Coached by	Greg and Helena Duplantis
Achievements and titles
Highest world ranking	1st (2020)
Personal best(s)	6.26 m WR (Silesia 2024)
Medal record Men's athletics Representing  Sweden Event 1st 2nd 3rd Olympic Games 2 0 0 World Championships 2 1 0 World Indoor Championships 2 0 0 Diamond League 4 0 0 World Indoor Tour 2 0 1 European Championships 3 0 0 European Indoor Championships 1 0 0 World Junior Championships 1 0 1 European Junior Championships 1 0 0 World Youth Championships 1 0 0 Olympic Games Gold 2020 Tokyo Pole vault Gold 2024 Paris Pole vault World Championships Silver 2019 Doha Pole vault Gold 2022 Eugene Pole vault Gold 2023 Budapest Pole vault World Indoor Championships Gold 2022 Belgrade Pole vault Gold 2024 Glasgow Pole vault Diamond League Final 2021 Zürich Pole vault 2022 Zürich Pole vault 2023 Eugene Pole vault 2024 Brussels Pole vault World Athletics Indoor Tour 2020 Pole vault 2022 Pole vault Third 2024 Pole vault European Championships Gold 2018 Berlin Pole vault Gold 2022 Munich Pole vault Gold 2024 Rome Pole vault European Indoor Championships Gold 2021 Toruń Pole vault World Junior Championships Bronze 2016 Bydgoszcz Pole vault Gold 2018 Tampere Pole vault European Junior Championships Gold 2017 Grosseto Pole vault World Youth Championships Gold 2015 Cali Pole vault

Armand Gustav Duplantis (born 10 November 1999), known mononymously as Mondo and also as Mondo Duplantis, is a Swedish-American pole vaulter. Regarded as the greatest pole vaulter of all time, Duplantis is the current world outdoor and indoor record holder [6.26 m (20 ft 6+1⁄2 in) and 6.22 m (20 ft 5 in) respectively]. He is a two-time Olympic (2020 and 2024) champion, two-time World outdoor (2022 and 2023) and indoor champion, and the current European champion.

Duplantis won titles as a 15-year-old at the 2015 World Youth Championships. A year later, he placed third at the World U20 Championships. In 2017, he took the European U20 title, and the following year, World U20 title. Duplantis is one of the very few athletes in history (including Usain Bolt) to win world championships at the youth, junior, and senior level of the athletics event.

Duplantis is a three-time European champion from 2018, when he set the current world under-20 record, and from 2022 and 2024. European and World Athletics Male Rising Star of the Year in 2018, two years later he was voted World Male Athlete of the Year. He was the 2021 European Indoor Championships gold medalist and at the 2020 Summer Olympics in Tokyo, Duplantis won his first Olympic gold medal. For his 2022 season, which saw him break world records three times, becoming World outdoor and indoor champion, European and Diamond League champion, and clearing six-metre-plus 22 times, Duplantis was crowned both European and World Male Athlete of the Year. Duplantis is a four-time Diamond League Champion, having qualified for and won the pole vault Diamond League Final event in four consecutive years, from 2021 to 2024.

As of August 2024^[update], Duplantis has cleared six metres or higher in competition more times than any athlete in history, including the ten highest heights of all time. After Renaud Lavillenie cleared 6.16 m (20 ft 2+1/2 in) in 2014, Duplantis has cleared every height from 6.17 m to his current world record of 6.26 m.

Early life

Duplantis was born into an athletic family in Lafayette, Louisiana. His American father, Greg Duplantis, is a former pole vaulter with a personal best of 5.80 m (19 ft +1⁄2 in), while his Swedish mother, Helena (née Hedlund), is a former heptathlete and volleyball player. Duplantis grew up primarily speaking English, but also learned Swedish as a second language. He spent summers with his Swedish grandparents.

His two older brothers, Andreas and Antoine, and his younger sister, Johanna, also took up sports; Andreas represented Sweden as a pole vaulter at the 2009 World Youth Championships and 2012 World Junior Championships, while Antoine dropped pole vault for baseball in high school before heading to Louisiana State University where he became the team's career hits leader in 2019.

Duplantis graduated from Lafayette High School in 2018 and, like his parents and brothers before him, attended Louisiana State University, though he left in 2019 after his first year in order to turn professional.

Early career

Duplantis first tried pole vaulting as a four-year-old at the family's home in Lafayette, Louisiana, and took to the event rapidly. He set his first age group world best at age seven, and his jump of 3.86 m (12 ft 8 in) as a 10-year-old surpassed the previous world bests for ages 11 and 12 as well. As of July 2015^[update], he holds the world best in all age groups from age seven to age 12; he held the age 13 record until it was broken in May 2015.

Duplantis' nickname "Mondo" was given to him at a very young age by his father's best friend who is an Italian from Sicily. "Mondo" means "world" in Italian. At first, he was called "Mondo Man" when he was just a kid before it was shortened to "Mondo". His nickname stuck with him since then perhaps as an ironic foreshadowing of his world domination and record breaking performance in his sport later in his professional career.

2015–2016: U18 world champion and competing for Sweden

During his freshman year at Lafayette High School in 2015, Duplantis set national freshman records both indoors and outdoors and was named Gatorade Louisiana Boys Track & Field Athlete of the Year.

In June 2015, Duplantis announced that he would compete for Sweden. As a citizen of both the United States and Sweden, he could have chosen to vault for either country internationally. According to Jonas Anshelm, the Sweden national team pole vault coach who recruited him, Duplantis had originally planned to compete for the United States, but chose Sweden in part because Anshelm had invited Duplantis's father to join the team as a coach. Duplantis has also said that his older brother's great experiences representing Sweden at a youth level, as well as his own love for Sweden as a child made the decision to play for Sweden very easy, but that he nonetheless still feels a strong bond to Lafayette.

Duplantis represented Sweden for the first time at the 2015 World Youth Championships in Cali, Colombia; where he won gold on countback with a first-attempt clearance of 5.30 m (17 ft 4+1⁄2 in), improving his personal best by two centimeters and setting a new championship record jointly with Ukrainian Vladyslav Malykhin.

On 6 February 2016, Duplantis cleared 5.49 m (18 ft 0 in) at a high school meet in Baton Rouge, setting a new age-16 world best, world indoor youth best and national high school indoor record; he was the first high school athlete to vault 18 feet indoors. Emmanouil Karalis of Greece, the same age as Duplantis, broke his world marks with a 5.53 m (18 ft 1+1⁄2 in) vault only one week later.

2017: U20 world record and U20 European title

On 11 February 2017, at the Millrose Games, Duplantis cleared 5.75 m (18 ft 10+1⁄2 in) to set the world indoor junior record. That mark was ratified by IAAF.

A month later, on 11 Mar, Duplantis improved his indoor personal record to 5.82 m (19 ft 1 in) in the same facility at the New Balance Nationals in New York City. His 5.82 m mark was however not ratified as a world indoor junior record by IAAF because an on-site anti-doping test did not occur in New York, leaving the official World U20 indoor record going into 2018 still at 5.75 m.

On 1 April, Duplantis cleared 5.90 m at the Clyde Littlefield Texas Relays, improving his personal record, setting a new World U20 Record and beating the previous record of 5.80 m set by Maksim Tarasov in 1989 and equalled by Raphael Holzdeppe in 2008 by an astonishong 10 cm. The vault also became a Swedish senior record beating previous mark of 5.87 m set by Oscar Janson in 2003 by . While the IAAF recognized the record with Duplantis representing Sweden, on 2 December 2017, USATF also ratified Duplantis's mark as the American junior record.

On 23 July, at the 2017 European Athletics U20 Championships In Grosset, Italy, Duplantis set a pole vault championship record of 5.65 m to win gold. Duplantis won the competition on just his second jump of the competition by clearing 5.55 m on his first attempt. He then set the bar to 5.65 m and on his third attempt, he soared over the bar to break a Maksim Tarasov's long standing championship record of 5.60 m set in 1989.

At the 2018 European Athletics Championships in Berlin, 18-year-old Duplantis won his first major senior title.

2018: U20 World champion, first major senior title and first jump over 6.00 m

On 12 January, Duplantis began his 2018 season with an indoor personal record by clearing 5.83 m (19 ft 1+1⁄2 in) at the Pole Vault Summit in Reno, Nevada. The 5.83m jump could have been ratified as a world indoor junior record if not for violation of some overlooked IAAF rules. In 2003, the IAAF changed the standard length of the pegs that the pole-vaulting crossbar rests on from 75 mm to 55 mm. Performances in the elite men's competition at the summit were invalidated two days later when it was discovered that 75 mm crossbar pegs were used on the pit for the men's elite competition instead of 55 mm mandated by IAAF. The elite women on a separate pit pole vaulted with the correct 55mm pegs. In addition, IAAF was unable to ratify the 5.83 m record because on-site doping control was absent in a similar reason IAAF did not ratify his best indoor mark of 5.82 m last year at the New Balance Narionals indoor event. IAAF rule requires an immediate test on site. Although Duplantis submitted to a drug test administered by a USADA official, it was only done the next morning and not at the Reno-Sparks Livestock Events Center where the meet was held.

On 25 February, at the All Star Perche pole vault meeting in the central French city of Clermont-Ferrand, Duplantis vaulted 5.88 m (19 ft 3+1⁄2 in) vault to better the pending world U20 indoor record of 5.78 m set by Emmanouil Karalis of Greece on 11 February. The 18-year-old first topped 5.81 m on his first attempt before improving the record to 5.88 m on his third try.

On 27 March, Duplantis was granted a one-time waiver of bylaw 6.1.3 in the LHSAA handbook by the state association to compete in the eilite men's pole vault section of the Texas Relays on 31 Mar without penalising his eligibility to compete for his high school. Before the waiver decision was announced, LHSAA faced criticism for choosing to elect rather than modernize a rule which was more to protect younger high school athletes from injury when competing with or against bigger elite athletes in contact sports.  Bylaw 6.1.3  prohibits an athlete of a high school team from competing with an elite team or against an elite competition. A year ago, Duplantis competed at the Texas Relays elite pole vault event wearing Lafayette High School colors only to find out later about a possible violation of the LHSAA rule. He won that event with a world U20 record of 5.90 m.

At the 2018 World U20 Championship held from 10 to 15 July in Tampere, Finland, Duplantis won gold and broke the championship record with a vault of 5.82 m (19 ft 1¹⁄₈ in).

On 12 August, Duplantis set a world U20 record of 6.05 m (19 ft 10 in) at the 2018 European Athletics Championships in Berlin, Germany to take gold in his first major senior championship title. In doing so, he raised his pesonal best by a massive 12 cm and it made him the youngest ever at 18-years-old to win a men's field event in the 84-year history of the championship and also the youngest ever to join the exclusive 6.00 m club. Even Sergey Bubka, the greatest pole vaulter of all then, did not clear 6.00 m until he was 21. His 6.05 m vault ranked him tied as the fourth-best pole vaulter in history, indoors or out and tied for the second-best outdoors.

2019: Collegiate season at LSU, turning pro

Duplantis enrolled at Louisiana State University in 2018. During his freshman year at LSU in 2019, Duplantis competed 10 times in the pole vault event. He set both the indoor and outdoor collegiate records, won indoor and outdoor SEC Championships titles, and won the NCAA Division I indoor title. The only defeat of his collegiate career came at the NCAA Division I outdoor championships when he took second place.

On 22 February, day 1 of the SEC Indoor Championships at the Randal Tyson Track Center in Fayetteville, Arkansas, Duplantis set a new collegiate indoor record of 5.92 m to claim gold in the event. The previous record was 5.91 m set by Shawn Barber of University of Akron on March 13, 2015. In addition to the indoor collegiate record, it is an SEC championship meet record, world lead for 2019, Swedish record, and an indoor personal best. On 21 February 2020, Duplantis' indoor collegiate record was surpassed by Chris Nilsen when he jumped 5.93 m.

On 11 May, Duplantis cleared 6.00 m at the SEC Outdoor Championships in Fayetteville, Arkansans., to set a new outdoor collegiate record. In the process, Duplantis helped LSU Tigers win its first SEC Outdoor Track and Field Championship since 1990 edging Florida Gators 105–95.

In June 2019, Duplantis announced that he was turning professional, thereby foregoing his remaining NCAA eligibility.

Professional career

Duplantis jumps 6.0 metres at Stockholm Stadium on 24 August 2019.

2019–2020: World championship silver medallist, first and second world records

On 24 August 2019, Duplantis clears 6.00 m (19 ft 8 in) to equal his season's best to take gold in the Finnkampen (an annual international athletics competition between Sweden and Finland) held in Stockholm, Sweden as hosts Sweden beat Finland in both the men's and women's competition. Duplantis' 6.00 m vault broke the competition record of 5.85 m held by Patrik Kristiansson of Finland since 2002. His teammate Melker Svärd Jacobsson came in second with a clearance of 5.36 m.

On 1 October, Duplantis placed second at the 2019 IAAF World Championships in Doha, Qatar, clearing 5.97 m (19 ft 7 in) on his third attempt.

On 4 February 2020, Duplantis cleared 6.00 m (19 ft 8 in) indoors at his first competition of the season in Düsseldorf, Germany. He followed that up with three attempts at a new world record of 6.17 m (20 ft 3 in). On his second attempt, he cleared the bar but brushed it off with his arm on the way back down.

On 8 February, Duplantis broke Renaud Lavillenie's almost-six-year-old world record with a jump of 6.17 m (20 ft 3 in) at a World Athletics Indoor Tour Meeting in Toruń, Poland. A week later, on 15 February at the Müller Indoor Grand Prix in Glasgow, he increased the record by another centimetre to 6.18 m (20 ft 3+1⁄2 in).

On 19 February, Duplantis won the Meeting Hauts de France Pas de Calais in Liévin, France by clearing 6.07 m (19 ft 11 in), after which he made three unsuccessful attempts at the new world record height of 6.19 m (20 ft 3+1⁄2 in). A few days later, on 23 February, he won the All Star Perche in Clermont-Ferrand, France by clearing 6.01 m (19 ft 8+1⁄2 in) in his last indoor competition for the season, which ended with new unsuccessful attempts at 6.19 m (20 ft 3+1⁄2 in). Duplantis ended his 2020 indoor season by becoming the first man in history to put together five consecutive indoor competitions at 6.00 m or higher. This streak was surpassed by himself in 2022 when he won six successive indoor competitions at 6.00 m or higher.

On 21 February, after the seventh and final Gold level meeting of the 2020 World Athletics Indoor Tour series in Madrid ended, Duplantis emerged as the overall winner of the 2020 World Indoor Tour after securing a total of 36 points from his best three results from the tour (which were in Toruń , Glasgow and Liévin). This is his first World Athletics Indoor Tour title.

On 17 September at the Rome Golden Gala Pietro Mennea Diamond League, Duplantis broke Sergey Bubka's outdoor world best of 6.14 m (20 ft 1+1⁄2 in), with a second-attempt clearance of 6.15 m (20 ft 2 in).Since 1998, World Athletics does not recognize the indoor world record and the outdoor world record as two separate world records in the pole vault event. Official world record can be set in a facility "with or without roof". A new indoor best mark is accepted as the new world record if it is better than the best outdoor mark; Duplantis already held the world record at 6.18 m (20 ft 3+1⁄2 in) from his indoor clearance in February 2020.

Duplantis at the 2020 BAUHAUS-galan meeting in Stockholm

2021: Olympic title in Tokyo and European indoor title

On 6 March, Duplantis competed at the 2021 European Indoor Championships. He was the overwhelming favourite to win the title after the late withdrawal of Renaud Lavillenie with injury. Duplantis was still tested by Piotr Lisek and Lavillenie's younger brother Valentin, who went on to claim bronze and silver respectively — the latter with a personal best. Duplantis however set a new championship record of 6.05 m (19 ft 10 in) before making three unsuccessful attempts at 6.19 m (20 ft 3+1⁄2 in), his second narrowly missing the world record.

At the one-year delayed 2020 Summer Olympics in Tokyo, Duplantis won a gold medal when he cleared a height of 6.02 m (19 ft 9 in) on his first effort, and afterwards got very close to beating his own world record. Silver medalist Chris Nilsen was full of praise for the winner. He compared the competition against Duplantis that evening as being a regular footballer "trying to emulate Lionel Messi or Cristiano Ronaldo" and that his superiority over the world's best pole vaulters was "impressive and ridiculous."

2022: New world records, first world titles and second European title

On 17 January, still only 22 and having won the award previously in 2019 and 2021, Duplantis was crowned Sportsman of the Year for the third time at the Swedish Sports Awards ceremony for his achievements in 2021. Duplantis won the European indoor and Olympic gold medals and cleared 6.00m or higher in 12 of his 17 competitions in 2021.

On 7 March, he beat his own world record by jumping 6.19 m (20 ft 3+1⁄2 in) at the Belgrade Indoor Meeting. Two weeks later, at the 2022 World Athletics Indoor Championships in Belgrade, he won the gold medal. At the same time, he broke his world record yet again, by jumping 6.20 m (20 ft 4 in).

On 30 June, at the BAUHAUS-galan, Duplantis broke his own outdoor world best of 6.15 m (20 ft 2 in) set in 2020, by jumping 6.16 m (20 ft 2+1⁄2 in).

On 24 July, he broke his own world record yet again to win gold, at the 2022 World Athletics Championships in Eugene, Oregon by recording a jump of 6.21 m (20 ft 4+1⁄2 in). Though this was Duplantus' fifth world record, it was the first time that he had broken a world record outdoors.

At the 2022 European Championships held in Munich, he won gold and broke the championship record with a jump of 6.06 m (19 ft 10+1⁄2 in).

Duplantis capped his season in September by clearing 6.07 m (19 ft 11 in) at the Zürich Diamond League final to retain the Diamond Trophy.

On the back of three world records, two global titles, a Diamond League trophy, winning 18 of his 19 competitions and 23 six meters or higher jumps in one season, Duplantis was named 2022 World Athlete of the Year by World Athletics on 6 December.

2023: Second world title and two more world records (sixth and seventh)

Duplantis got his 2023 campaign off to strong start at the Mondo Classic in Uppsala, the meet named after his nickname. His winning height of 6.10 m (20 ft 0 in) represented not only his best ever season opener but also the highest season-opening performance of any pole vaulter in history. He also broke Bubka's record of 11 vaults of 6.10 m or higher (including indoors and outdoors).

On 25 February at the All Star Perche indoor meeting in Clermont-Ferrand, France, Duplantis broke the world record again, clearing 6.22 m (20 ft 5 in) to increase the number of his career six-metre-plus jumps to 60. On 26 August 2023, Duplantis defended his world title at the 2023 World Athletics Championahips in Budapest, Hungary with a winning jump of 6.10 m (20 ft 0 in).

On 17 September, he broke his own world record when he cleared 6.23 m (20 ft 5 1/4 in) at the Prefontaine Classic in Eugene, Oregon.

On 11 December, Duplantis emerged as the first recipient of the World Athlete of the Year (Men's field) award from World Athletics. Although this is Duplantis' third senior award from World Athletics having previously won the World Athlete of the Year award in 2020 and 2022, the 2023 award "World Athlete of the Year (Men's field)" is considered an inaugural award because World Athletics Awards changed from crowning a sole male and female winner to issuing three separate awards for men and three separate ones for women across three event categories: track, field and out of stadia.

2024: Second world indoor title, third European title, second Olympic title in Paris and three more world records

Armand Duplantis, pole vaulting qualification, 3rd of August 2024, Paris 2024 Olympics.

At the 2024 World Athletics Indoor Championships in Glasgow, in March, Duplantis made a vault of 6.05 m, winning the gold medal.

On 26 February, for a second year in a row and a third time in his career, Duplantis was nominated, along with Lionel Messi, Novak Djokovic, Erling Haaland, Noah Lyles, and Max Verstappen, for the prestigious Laureus World Sportsman of the Year award for 2024 (Djokovic won).

On 20 April, at the Xiamen Diamond League meeting in Xiamen, China, the first stage of the 2024 Diamond League, Duplantis improved his world record by one centimeter, clearing 6.24 m on his first attempt.

On 12 June, he won the 2024 European Championships in Rome, being the only competitor to clear the six-meter mark. Assured of the title, he set a new European Championships record of 6.10 meters on his first attempt before failing in his three attempts to break the world record. With his 6.10m clearance, Duplantis achieved his 60th six metres plus competition so far. The next best in history is Sergey Bubka at 44.

On 5 August, at the Paris Olympics, Duplantis retained his Olympic title from 2020. He won with a jump of 6.00 m, after Sam Kendricks failed to clear higher than 5.95 m. He then jumped 6.10 m to break the Olympic record set by Thiago Braz at the 2016 Olympics and finally jumped 6.25 m, on his third attempt at that height, setting a new world record. In an interesting repeat of the 2024 European Championships, Duplantis was the only competitor to clear 6 m, cleared both 6.00 m and 6.10 m on his first try and again attempted to break his own world record of 6.24 m. He both created a world record and broke his own Olympic record, set 20 minutes earlier.

With his title at the Paris Olympics, the 24-year-old Duplantis became the first back-to-back Olympic champion in men's pole vault since American Bob Richards, who won in the 1952 Helsinki Games and the 1956 Melbourne Games. Duplantis and Richards are the only men's pole vaulters with two Olympic golds in the event.

Duplantis' uncanny ability to perform under pressure and to continually improve and break world record have solidified his status as a once-in-a-generation talent in athletics. His accomplishments representing Sweden at major global and contitental championships are unpararelled. As of August 2024, he has set a total of 9 championships records and an olympic record collectively at youth, junior and senior level competitions including rewriting the world record on three occasions when he won global titles: a 6.20m clearance at the 2022 World Athletics Indoor Championships in Belgrade, a 6.21m clearance at the 2022 World Athletics Championships in Oregon and his latest 6.25m clearance at the 2024 Paris Olympics.

His dominance in the event has drawn comparison to legends in other sports. The New York Times reported that Duplantis is to pole vaulting what Usain Bolt was to sprinting; Michael Phelps to swimming; Simone Biles to gymnastics. Duplantis' supremacy in the pole vault is so overwhelming that he often best his peers by almost a foot - a staggering gap considering medals are often won by margins of a centimeter. His consistency has been unmatched having won all his competition events since July 2023 when the super Swede last tasted defeat at a Diamond League event in Monaco. By winning a second straight Olympic gold medal and breaking the record for the ninth time — each time by one centimete, Duplantis established himself as the greatest pole vaulter of all time. His victory at the Paris Olympics also marked the point he has passed the rarefied height of retired Ukrainian pole vaulter Sergey Bubka, his main competition in the argument for the greatest pole vaulter of all time.

On 25 August, at the Kamila Skolimowska Memorial in Chorzów, Poland, the twelfth stop on the 2024 Diamond League, Duplantis improved his world record for the tenth time in his career and the third time in 2024 by one centimetre, increasing the world record to 6.26 m. The men's pole vault event at the Silesian Stadium saw two other jumpers (Sam Kendricks of the US and Greece's Emmanouil Karalis) cleared six metres besides Duplantis making it the first time in history that three pole vaulters broke the 6.00 m barrier in a single competition.

At the Silesia Diamond League's pre-competition press conference, meet organisers announced a historic award for the most valuable athlete of the meet, as judged by World Athletics points system. In one of the most remarkable moment in track and field history, Jakob Ingebrigtsen shattered the longest-standing men's athletics world record in an individual event, clocking a staggering 7:17.55 for the 3000m, taking more than three seconds off the mark of 7:20.67 set by Kenya's Daniel Komen in 1996. He was expected to win the inaugural MVP award. However, incredibly, after converting all results into World Athletics points, Ingebrigtsen running 7:17 for 3000m was not enough to win. Mondo's 6.26m pole vault world record was worth 1339 points to 1320 for Ingebrigtsen's 3000 m world record time of 7.17.55. Duplantis turned out to be the historic first MVP of the meeting and took home a sparkling 14-carat gold diamond-encrusted 'Champion Ring' worth $10,000, along with a cheque for the same amount. This was on top of the $50,000 bonus he received for breaking the world record.

"Karsten vs. Mondo"

On 4 September, the day before the Zürich Diamond League, Duplantis competed in an exhibition 100 m event against 400 m hurdles world record holder Karsten Warholm. Duplantis won in a new personal best of 10.37 seconds, while Warholm finished second in 10.47 seconds, also a personal best.

On 13 September, Duplantis rounded off his stellar 2024 campaign with a fourth consecitive Diamond League trophy at the 2024 Final in Brussels, winning the competition with a meet record of 6.11 m.

On 26 Oct, Duplantis was crowned men's European Athlete of the Year for the first time outright having previously shared the award with Jakob Ingebrigtsen in 2022.

On 6 November, Duplantis joined a network of sports stars such as Brazilian footballer Neymar Jr and Norwegian hurdler Karsten Warholm to become global ambassabor for the Wings for Life World Run charity event to be held on 4 May 2025 to raise funds for spinal cord injury research.

Awards and recognition

In July 2020, Duplantis received the Victoria Award, Sweden's highest sporting accolade. In December that year, he was awarded the Svenska Dagbladet Gold Medal or Bragdguldet for "the most significant Swedish sports achievement of the year," and in early 2021, the Jerring Award, recognizing him as the most popular athlete in Sweden that year; Duplantis expressed relief that the Swedish public had accepted and embraced him.

At the 2021 Swedish Sports Awards Gala held on 18 January, Duplantis received a total of four awards. Besides the Bragdguldet announced earlier in December 2020, Duplantis also took away the Radiosporten's Jerring Award and the Swedish Sports Academy's Sportsman of the Year and the Performance of the Year awards, his second for both awards. The awards came on the back of a watershed season in 2020 when he set his first two world records: 6.17 m and 6.18 m indoors and an world outdoor best: 6.15 m. On top of that, he was undefeated in 2020. Duplantis' parents Greg and Helena Duplantis also received the Coach of the Year award from the academy that evening at the gala.

Duplantis has won a number of awards from World Athletics. They included a Rising Star of the Year (Men) award in 2018 as well as four Athlete of the Year awards including three outright World Athlete of the Year awards in 2020, 2022 and 2023 (Men's field) and a Field Athlete of the Year award in 2024. The overall World Athlete of the Year in 2024 was won by Letsiie Tebogo of Botswana.

He has also won similar accolades from European Athletics Association. They included a Rising Star of the Year award in 2018 and two Athlete of the Year award in 2022 and 2024.

Duplantis was named 2024 BBC Sports Personality World Sport Star of the Year.

Personal life

Encouraged by his mother, Duplantis took extensive lessons over Skype in order to improve his Swedish language fluency, and by 2020, felt that he understood native speech much better and faster than he could in the past. His mother claimed at the same time that while Duplantis felt shy about speaking Swedish in public, he was very happy to do so in private, where there was less pressure. By 2021, after winning Olympic gold in Tokyo, his knowledge of the language had improved to the point that he felt comfortable giving interviews fully in Swedish. Previously, Duplantis had lamented that improving his Swedish had been somewhat hampered by the high level of English skills in Sweden, which has led to native speakers preferring to speak English when talking with him.

Duplantis usually divides his year between winters in Louisiana and summers in Uppsala in Sweden, adapted for when the two climates offer the best possibilities for training. The municipality of Avesta, where Duplantis's mother was raised, erected a pole vault bar beside the gigantic Dala horse monument to showcase the height of his world record, something that made Duplantis "break down in tears" over the significance of what he had accomplished when he heard about it.

Duplantis is currently dating Swedish model and content creator Desiré Inglander, whom he met at a midsummer party in Sweden in 2020. Duplantis and Inglander announced their engagement on 11 October 2024 after a surprise proposal by Duplantis to Inglander during a photo shoot for Vogue Scandinavia in the seaside resort The Hamptons in New York.

Achievements

Duplantis celebrating his 6.0 m jump in pole vault on 24 August 2019 in Stockholm

Information from World Athletics profile.

International competitions

Representing  Sweden

Year	Competition	Venue	Position	Result	Notes
2015	World U18 Championships	Cali, Colombia	1st	5.30 m	CR
2016	World U20 Championships	Bydgoszcz, Poland	3rd	5.45 m
2017	European U20 Championships	Grosseto, Italy	1st	5.65 m	CR
	World Championships	London, United Kingdom	9th	5.50 m
2018	World Indoor Championships	Birmingham, United Kingdom	7th	5.70 m i
	World U20 Championships	Tampere, Finland	1st	5.82 m	CR
	European Championships	Berlin, Germany	1st	6.05 m	CR WU20R
2019	World Championships	Doha, Qatar	2nd	5.97 m
2021	European Indoor Championships	Torun, Poland	1st	6.05 m i	CR
	Olympic Games	Tokyo, Japan	1st	6.02 m
2022	World Indoor Championships	Belgrade, Serbia	1st	6.20 m i	WR CR
	World Championships	Eugene, USA	1st	6.21 m	WR CR
	European Championships	Munich, Germany	1st	6.06 m	CR
2023	World Championships	Budapest, Hungary	1st	6.10 m
2024	World Indoor Championships	Glasgow, United Kingdom	1st	6.05 m i
	European Championships	Rome, Italy	1st	6.10 m	CR
	Olympic Games	Paris, France	1st	6.25 m	WR OR

Circuit wins and titles

• Diamond League pole vault champion: 2021, 2022, 2023, 2024
  • 2018 (1): Stockholm
  • 2019 (1): Stanford
  • 2020 (7): Oslo, Monaco, Stockholm (WL MR), Lausanne (WL MR DLR), Brussels (MR), Rome (WL DLR NR), Doha (=MR)
  • 2021 (5): Oslo (MR), Stockholm (MR), Paris (MR), Brussels (MR), Zürich (MR)
  • 2022 (7): Doha, Eugene, Oslo (WL MR), Stockholm (DLR MR), Chorzów Silesia (MR), Lausanne (MR), Zürich (MR)
  • 2023 (6): Oslo, Stockholm, Chorzów Silesia, Zürich, Brussels (MR), Eugene (WR DLR)
  • 2024 (8): Xiamen (WR DLR), Shanghai, Stockholm, Paris, Lausanne (MR), Chorzów Silesia (WR DLR), Zürich, Brussels (MR)

Progression and world records

Key:       Lifetime best;   Season's best,   Other world records

Source:

Honours and awards

• Laureus World Sports Awards
  • Sportsman of the Year (Nominee): 2021, 2023, 2024
• International Sports Press Association (AIPS) Best Athlete of the Year (Men)
  • 2022 (2nd), 2023 (2nd), 2024 (Winner)
• BBC Sports Personality of the Year Awards
  • BBC World Sport Star of the Year: 2024
• L'Équipe Champion of Champions
  • Internarional Male Athlete of the Year: 2024 (2nd)
• PAP European Sportsperson of the Year Award
  • 2020 (3rd), 2022 (2nd), 2023 (3rd), 2024 (3rd)
• Forbes 30 under 30
  • North America List - Sports (2025)
• The Swedish Victoria Award (2020)
• Swedish Sports Academy Awards (See: Svenska idrottsgalan)
  • Newcomer of the Year: 2018
  • Sportsman of the Year: 2019, 2021, 2022, 2024, 2025
  • Performance of the Year: 2019, 2021, 2025
• The Swedish Jerring Award: 2020
• The Swedish Svenska Dagbladet Gold Medal: 2020, 2024
• World Athletics Awards
  • Rising Star of the Year (Men): 2018
  • World Athlete of the Year (Men): 2020, 2022, 2023 (Men's field), 2024 (Men's Field)
• European Athletics Awards
  • Rising Star of the Year (Men): 2018
  • European Athlete of the Year (Men): 2022, 2024
  • European Athlete of the Month (Men): Apr 2017, Apr 2019, Feb 2020, Sep 2021, Jun 2022, Jul 2022
• Swedish Athletics Association Awards
  • Stora grabbars märke (or Big Boys Badge): 2019
• Athletics Weekly Readers' Choice Awards
  • International Male Athlete of the Year: 2022, 2023, 2024
  • Mel Watman Award for Performance of the Year: 2024
• Track & Field News Awards
  • World Men's Athlete of the Year: 2000 (MVP), 2022, 2024
• U.S. Track & Field and Cross Country Coaches Association (USTFCCCA) Award
  • The Bowerman: 2019 (Finalist)
  • Indoor South Central Field Athlete of the Year: 2019
• 2019 SEC Indoor Track & Field Awards
  • Men's Field Athlete of the Year
  • Men's Freshman Field Athlete of the Year
• 2019 SEC Outdoor Track & Field Awards
  • Men's Field Athlete of the Year
  • Men's Freshman Field Athlete of the Year

See also

In Spanish: Armand Duplantis para niños