Reese vs. Bartoletta: A Gold Medal Clash in Pre Classic Women’s Long Jump

Prefontaine Classic

The only American women besides Jackie Joyner-Kersee to win Olympic gold in the long jump will lead the world’s best at the Prefontaine Classic.

The incredible field includes all three of last year’s Olympic medalists from Rio. They waged a thrilling battle that ended with two lifetime bests and a podium full of the last three Pre Classic winners.

The Prefontaine focus will be on the Americans who completed the first U.S. 1-2 Olympic finish with Tianna Bartoletta earning gold less than an inch ahead of Brittney Reese, the London gold medalist.

Brittney Reese, 30, is the most accomplished jumper in the field.  She has eight major medals – seven of them gold.  Despite earning her only silver in Rio, Reese finished the season ranked No. 1 in the world by Track & Field News for the sixth time.  Her previous five (2009-13) marked the event’s first time a jumper had put up five consecutive No. 1s.

Reese, an active Twitter user with the handle @DaLJBeast, was the favorite going into Rio, having won a third World Indoor gold in Portland and then her first Pre Classic in five attempts dating to 2009.  And especially so after jumping a PR 23-11¾ (7.31) at Hayward Field to win her 10th U.S. title with the farthest jump on U.S. soil since Joyner-Kersee’s American record 24-7 (7.49) in 1994.

She took the lead in round 5 in Rio at 23-3¼ (7.09), poised to become the first woman to successfully defend her Olympic crown.  After being passed by Bartoletta, Reese improved in the last round to 23-5½ (7.15), less than inch away from gold.   Reese’s three Olympic finals are topped among Americans only by Joyner-Kersee’s four in this event.

Tianna Bartoletta, 31, won two gold medals in Rio – first in the titanic long jump, then two days later leading off the U.S. 4 x 100-meter team with the second-fastest time in history at 41.01.  She led off the fastest-ever squad four years earlier, when the Americans set the world record of 40.82 in the London Olympics.

Bartoletta’s amazing timing for long jump bests in big meets dates back to 2005, when as a 19-year-old she won the World Championships in Helsinki in a PR 22-7¼ (6.89).  A year later, she scored an indoor best with a gold at the 2006 Moscow World Indoor Championships.  Her gold medal at the 2015 Beijing World Championships came with a lifetime best 23-5½ (7.15), and if Bartoletta hadn’t jumped her 23-6¼ (7.17) best in Rio she would have switched positions with Reese.  Even her lone Pre Classic victory in 2015 was achieved with a wind-aided 23-4 (7.11), her best under any conditions at the time.

The third medalist from Rio is Serbia’s Ivana Spanovic, who will turn 27 on May 10.  After being displaced from the gold medal position – first by Reese, then Bartoletta – Spanovic responded with the two longest performances of her career but still wound up with the bronze medal.  It matched her finishes in the 2013 and 2015 World Championships, won by Reese and Bartoletta, respectively.  Her top international effort came last year in Portland, where she earned silver at the World Indoor Championships.

Since the Rio Games, Spanovich has been on a tear.  She won the Diamond League trophy last year and ended the season with a lifetime best of 23-3½ (7.10) – a mark she improved to 23-9 (7.24) last month with a victory at the European Indoor Championships in Belgrade, the capital of her home country.  Spanovic has jumped 22-7 (6.88) twice at the Pre Classic, winning in 2014 and finishing 2nd to Reese last year by just over an inch.

Lorraine Ugen, 25, of Great Britain will return to the Pre Classic, where she was 3^rd the last two years and was ranked No. 5 in the world by T&FN both years.  A two-time NCAA champion while at Texas Christian, she was bronze medalist at last year’s World Indoor and jumped a PR 22-10½ (6.97) to earn silver at last month’s European Indoor behind Spanovich.

Estonia’s Ksenija Balta, 26, was ranked No. 4 in the world last year by T&FN, her first appearance in the world top 10 since 2009.  She won the European Indoor that year and finished 2nd at the Pre Classic by one centimeter with the day’s best wind-legal jump.  She was 6th in Rio last summer and 5th in the European Indoor last month, both with a best 22-3½ (6.79).

Darya Klishina, 26, was Russia’s lone participant in track & field at Rio last summer. Klishina, who lives and trains in Florida, has been in the T&FN  top 10 world rankings all but one year since she was 19 in 2010 – she was No. 3 and moved up to No. 2 in 2011.  She has made every major world final since 2010 and won the European Indoor title in 2011 and ’13.  In 2014 she jumped just as far as Spanovic at the Pre Classic (22-7/6.88) but finished 2nd due to a lower second-best mark.

Fans can follow the event lineups as all announced fields are posted at PreClassic.com.  The direct link to current start/entry lists is HERE and will include updates to all announced fields.

Tickets for the 43^rd annual edition of the Prefontaine Classic, to be held May 26-27 at Hayward Field in Eugene, Ore., are available now at www.GoDucks.com as well as from 1-800-WEBFOOT.  Sponsored by NIKE continuously since 1984, the Prefontaine Classic will be shown live to an international audience by NBC.

The Prefontaine Classic is the longest-running outdoor invitational track & field meet in America and is part of the elite IAAF Diamond League of meets held worldwide annually.  The Pre Classic’s results score has rated No. 1 or No. 2 in the world in each of the last six years by All-Athletics.com, the official data partner of the Diamond League.