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PARIS 2024 OLYMPICS

WATCH: The moment US-born Swede Armand Duplantis cemented his place in Olympic history

Did you watch Sweden's 'Mondo' break the pole vault world record in Paris? If not, you missed something spectacular. Catch up here.

Published: 6 August 2024 06:39 CEST
WATCH: The moment US-born Swede Armand Duplantis cemented his place in Olympic history
Armand Duplantis, of Sweden, gets a kiss after setting a new world record during the men's pole vault final at the 2024 Summer Olympics. Photo: AP Photo/David J Phillip

Sweden’s Armand Duplantis cemented his place in pole vaulting history by defending his Olympic crown in world record-setting style on Monday to underline his total dominance in the discipline.

The 24-year-old US-born prodigy, often described as a rock star of athletics by World Athletics chief Sebastian Coe, set a new world record of 6.25 metres as he claimed a second gold.

It was the first time in 68 years, since Bob Richards in 1952 and 1956, that a vaulter has won back-to-back titles.

Duplantis has been practically unbeatable over the last five years, winning every major title in the sport after being beaten at the Doha worlds in 2019 by American Sam Kendricks, who won silver on Monday.

Duplantis won Olympic gold in Tokyo three years ago before winning back-to-back outdoor World Championships in 2022 and 2023. He added two world indoor crowns in 2022 and 2024 as well as three straight European Championship titles in 2018, 2022 and 2024.

He is not immune to setting world records at global championships and Paris was the third time. It was also his ninth successive progression of the mark.

He broke the record twice in 2020, three times in 2022, twice in 2023 and for the first time this year, in April in the Xiamen Diamond League meet.

Duplantis said you get used to the pressure of being the man everyone wants to beat.

“Every competition I go to I’m going to be a big favourite. It is what it is. The reason for that is that I have been showing it as well,” he said.

“I go into every competition trying to jump as high as I possibly can. I think it should be enough to do what I know I can do. You get used to it and you know how to control it.”

Coached by his American father Greg, a former pole vaulter, Duplantis is a product of a track and field-crazy family which had their own vaulting apparatus in the garden, though he insists he was no “lab rat”.

“I started pole vaulting when I was about four years old,” Duplantis has said.

The six-time Louisiana state champion, who spent summers with his Swedish maternal grandparents in Sweden, added: “When you have a pole vault pit in your back yard, you’re going to try it.

“I fell in love with pole vault at a young age and stuck with it.”

Duplantis had already surpassed his father’s personal best by the age of 17.

He announced his prodigious talent to a wider audience when he won the European outdoor title in Berlin in 2018 with a vault of 6.05m, a world junior record.

From then on, apart from the “blip” in Qatar, it has been a bed of roses for Duplantis, whose world record now stands a massive 9cm further than a previous best by another jumper, France’s Renaud Lavillenie.

The only rival to have hit the 6m barrier is American Chris Nilsen in Eugene in February. He was absent from Paris and his closest rival on the day was Kendricks with 5.95m.

Such is his dominance, Duplantis often enters competition when half the field have already bombed out.

He is then left in his element, goading the public into raucous support as he first nails victory and then ups the bar for a world record attempt.

So it was at a packed Stade de France, Duplantis playing his part to perfection in a performance that could not have been better scripted.

Article by AFP’s Luke Phillips

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FOOD AND DRINK

Why were guests at Sven-Göran Eriksson’s funeral served porridge and ‘molusk’?

Guests at the funeral of Swedish football legend Sven-Göran Eriksson were to be treated to a menu of local Värmland cuisine on Friday: motti and molusk.

Published: 13 September 2024 10:59 CEST
Why were guests at Sven-Göran Eriksson's funeral served porridge and 'molusk'?

Sven-Göran Eriksson, one of Sweden’s most famous football icons, passed away at the end of August, just a few months after he went public with the news that he had terminal pancreatic cancer in January this year.

His funeral was scheduled for 10am on Friday in his hometown, Torsby, in Värmland. Many aspects of the funeral were planned by Eriksson himself, who was famously proud of his roots in Värmland and much-loved in Torsby for his down-to-earth, friendly nature.

Eriksson requested that the funeral be open to the public, so the 600-seater church was expected to be packed with a mix of small-town locals alongside his star-studded guestlist, including former England captain David Beckham and fellow England manager Roy Hodgson.

As the number of people interested in attending far exceeded space in the church, the local town set up a big screen outside where onlookers wishing to pay their respects would be able follow the funeral live.

“I think there will be as many people outside as inside the church,” Christopher Janson from Torsby’s funeral parlor told local newspaper NWT. “He was so folklig [down to earth], remembered people and checked up on his old school classmates. He was definitely a popular figure in town.”

After the ceremony, there was set to be a procession accompanied by Torsby’s local brass band – again, Eriksson’s own request, inspired by the funeral of Italian team Sampdoria’s former president, which Eriksson attended in 1993.

The procession was due to end at Kollsbergs hembygdsgĂĄrd, where guests were to be treated to local specialties motti and molusk.

But what exactly does that entail?

Luckily for the guests, the molusk has no relation to slimy invertebrates, rather it’s a cake made to the same recipe as a chocolate ball (chokladboll in Swedish) – oats, cocoa powder, butter and sugar – rolled into a log and dipped in chocolate.

Molusk cakes from Wienerkonditoriet in Torsby. Photo: Wienerkonditoriet

“It was Svennis’ request to have molusks and I think it’s because the molusk is a well-known cake from Torsby which has been baked here since the 1950s,” Lisa Nordqvist, from Wienerkonditoriet in Torsby, who supplied the cakes for the funeral reception, told The Local.

“We make the original and everyone who comes from Torsby has heard of it. A lot of people who have visited or have connections to Torsby speak highly of it,” she continued.

Motti, on the other hand, has its roots in Finland, and was brought by Finns to Värmland in the 1600s. It’s a type of porridge made from a special kind of flour called skrädmjöl, which is made from toasted oats.

It’s considered to be Värmland’s national dish, and is made by dumping the flour on top of some sort of liquid, either water or stock, and letting it steam for around ten minutes.

This results in a lumpy, relatively dry porridge which was traditionally eaten with the hands – another word for it is nävgröt, “fist porridge”.

It’s usually served with lingonberry jam and fried fläsk, which is similar to bacon, but slightly thicker, where the lumps of porridge are dipped into the jam and bacon fat.

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