Flying beauty bird, Yelena Isinbayeva

Her beautiful look of flying in pole-vault earned her the nickname “Beauty Bird”. She was born in Russia 1982 and trained as a gymnast in her hometown of Volgograd from the age of 5 to 15 but she had to leave the sport because her height is too tall to be competitive in gymnastics. She turned this misfortune to her advantage by being the best world women pole vaulter. She already learned basic strength, resilience and flexibility through gymnastics.

Nowadays, lots of people know women’s pole vault event thanks to her but it took around 16 years to be designated as an official event in World Championships in Athletics in Seville 1999 since the first Championship in 1983. In Olympic Games, women’s pole vault event became the official from Sydney Olympics 2000.

The world’s best record in women’s pole vault was 4m 75 before her appearance. But she subsequently set a new record height of 4.91m in Athens Olympics 2004. She won the gold medal in World Championships in Helsinki 2005 as a record of 5.01m.

Her best record till now is at the Weltklasse Golden League meeting by clearing 5.06m. Not only her remarkable record but also her stunning beauty helped her be athletic star.

She often appears in fashion show and other big events not only athletic field. She broke her personal record 27 times but her target is to break world records 36 times since original human bird Sergey Bubka rewrote world records 35 times.


In an interview with foreign press, she answered that Daegu gave the most impressive welcome when she visited Korea 2006. We hope that she’ll achieve better records when she comes to Daegu in Aug 2011 for World Championships.