Cuba’s Leyanis Perez Hernandez had been the best competitor all year but with the greatest triple jumper in history, Yulimar Rojas, returning after a two-year absence, the stage was set for an intriguing final at the World Athletics Championships Tokyo 25.
Such is the aura around the four-time world champion and world record-holder from Venezuela, that Rojas’ chances of adding a fifth world title could not be discounted.
However, Perez Hernandez, who won her first global title at the World Indoor Championships in Nanjing this year, arrived in Tokyo with great momentum after a stellar international season, and was not in the mood to be denied.
The 23-year-old Cuban led the competition from first to last, twice jumping the winning distance of 14.94m, in both the fourth and the sixth round, to underline her superiority. Any of her best three jumps would have been enough for victory.
By setting the world lead, a one centimetre improvement on her winning performance in Nanjing, she completed a season in which she has won everything that mattered, including the Wanda Diamond League Final in Zurich.
For one suspenseful moment in the sixth round, it appeared that Olympic champion Thea LaFond may have snatched the world title, as she summoned her biggest leap of the year, but it was eventually measured at 14.89m, good enough for the silver medal.
While it was just short of victory, and the 15.02m personal best she set in Paris last year, the Dominican was delighted to step on to the podium again.
Having won Dominica’s first Olympic medal last year, she created another slice of history as the first woman from her country to win a World Championships medal.
An achilles tendon injury sidelined Rojas throughout 2024 and most of 2025, but she also competed here with strapping on her right knee. She began the competition promisingly with a leap of 14.76m, but she lacked the usual spring in her step.
No matter how much she exhorted herself and appealed to the sellout crowd for extra energy, she was unable to improve on that initial effort, and had to settle for the bronze medal.
However, that in itself is remarkable, given her long absence from the competition runway.
Perez Hernandez said the world title was even more meaningful to her with Rojas landing on the podium beside her.
“This is an incredible year for me with both the world indoor and outdoor gold,” she said. “It was a special night for Cuban women tonight. I will tell my fellow Cuban women to keep fighting. I have fallen and bounced back. There’s a lot of sacrifice, but nothing beats the satisfaction of improving oneself and winning a medal.”
Her fellow Cuban Liadagmis Povea finished just short of the podium in fourth place (14.72m), as she did at last year’s Paris Olympics. Olympic silver medallist Shanieka Ricketts of Jamaica (14.56m) completed the top five.
Rojas was grateful to be back competing at all, but admitted she had hoped to return in triumph.
“I’m very emotional – with mixed feelings,” she said.
“It was a blessing for me to be back in the World Championships final after the past two years were so difficult. I’m very proud of that and it’s a victory for me. I’m back on the podium but I wanted more. I feel deep inside that I could have done way better. But this is sport… you have to go through hard times and show you can come back. That’s what I did and it means a lot.”
The last time she competed in the Japan National Stadium, she set a world record of 15.67m to win the Olympic gold medal.
In the meantime, the next generation has arrived, and the Venezuelan will have to recapture her former standard if she is to regain the dominance she had from 2017 to 2023, when she collected an astonishing eight global titles.
Nicole Jeffery for World Athletics
AloJapan.com