Silver and bronze for Australian high jumpers

Australians Nicola Olyslagers and Eleanor Patterson have won the silver and bronze medals in the women’s high jump at the Paris Olympics.

New world record holder Yaroslava Mahuchikh from Ukraine claimed the gold medal on countback with a first-time clearance at 2m on Sunday.

Olyslagers stayed in the competition with a clutch third and final clearance at 2m, but then missed three times at 2.02m.

It was the 27-year-old Australian’s second successive Olympic silver.

Patterson tied for the bronze with Ukraine’s Iryna Gerashchenko on countback with first-time clearances at 1.95m.

Patterson, 28, has won gold and silver at the previous two world championships in Eugene and Budapest but this was her first Olympic medal.

Once the gold medal was safely in her keeping on Sunday, Mahuchikh had one unsuccessful crack at 2.04m.

The great Ukrainian broke the 37-year-old world record with a clearance of 2.10m at the Paris Diamond League meet at Stade de France in early July.

She also relegated Patterson and Olyslagers to the minor medal positions at the 2023 world championships in Budapest.

The leading Australian and Ukrainian jumpers have dominated women’s high jump on the global stage in recent years and Sunday’s final was just the latest installation of that battle.

Reece Holder caused a boilover in the opening round of the men’s 400m, leading world No.1 Quincy Hall of the US into the final straight and holding on for third spot to advance to the semis on his Olympic debut.

Holder’s personal best time of 44.53 seconds moved him up three places to second on the Australian all-time list behind Darren Clark.

“Without being too cocky my training splits have been a little bit faster than that so I was expecting to be out there,” said the 21-year-old Holder, who tore his hamstring at the national championships in April.

“But I didn’t think I’d do that in the heats, that’s for sure.”

Abbey Caldwell and Claudia Hollingsworth were eliminated in the women’s 800m semi-finals.