Just Kwaou-Mathey became just the fifth European sprint hurdler in history to break the 13 second-barrier with victory in the 110m hurdles at the French Championships in Talence in 12.99.
Kwaou-Mathey was building up to something special through the rounds, clocking 13.10 in his heat followed by 13.11 in the semifinals before exploding in the final to a 12.99 clocking to dispatch a stellar field including Sasha Zhoya (13.18) and Wilhem Belocian (13.23) who finished second and third respectively.
The clock initially stopped at 13.01 before being corrected to a history-making 12.99. This was his first ever sub-13 second performance and moves him up to fifth on the European all-time behind Colin Jackson (12.91), Sergey Shubenkov (12.92), Pascal Martinot-Lagarde (12.95) and Ladji Doucoure (12.97), all of whom were crowned either world or European champion.
In global terms Kwaou-Mathey moves to second on the 2025 world list behind Cordell Tinch from the United States who clocked 12.87 in May.
Melvin Raffin also moved to equal second on the 2025 world list in the triple jump with an enormous lifetime best of 17.52m in the sixth round, the equal longest jump outdoors in 2025 with the World Athletics Championships in Tokyo just over one month away.
Now 39, 2012 Olympic champion Renaud Lavillenie rolled back the years to win his 11th national outdoor pole vault title, and his first since 2020, with a 5.82m clearance.
Gabriel Bordier, who won individual bronze in the 20km race walk at the 2025 European Race Walking Team Championships, also made history at the French Championships with a world best of 37:23.99 in the 10,000m race walk.
His time eclipses the previous world best of 37:25.21 set by Japan’s Eiki Takahashi in 2020.
More to follow…
