Gold for Pinnock in Paris?

In his second World Athletics Championships long jump final, Jamaica’s Wayne Pinnock moved up from ninth to scarcely an inch away from the gold medal last August in Budapest. Jeremy Delisser, Pinnock’s coach when he was at Kingston College (KC), believes things will be different this year at the Olympic Games in Paris, France.

“I expect him to improve based on what he did last year in terms of the distance. Once he improves, he’s definitely going to be a threat,” said Delisser at the Jamaica College Invitational at the weekend. Pinnock produced a personal best 8.54 metres in the World Championships qualifying and 8.50m in the final, where Greek hero Miltiadis Tentoglu completed a World-Olympic-World Indoor-European gold medal collection with a last round leap taped at 8.52m.

His overall season, which includes a win at the Jamaican National Championships, earned Pinnock the number two spot in the annual Track And Field News world rankings issue.

One of Pinnock’s assets has always been speed and he was flying at the World Championships. However, he managed to avoid foul trouble which often happens to speed jumpers.

“He has always had the aptitude for sprinting. As you know, sprint hurdles, and he was a part of the 39.98 seconds 4x100m team in high school, so he definitely has improved and going into this year, I think you’ll actually see him a little bit faster as well, so for me, that’s a good sign going to Paris,” Delisser reminded in particular reference to Pinnock’s 2019 Boys and Girls’ Championships long jump 110m hurdles double achieved with record performances of 8.05m and 13.06 seconds.

At the World Championships, the 2018 World Under-20 bronze medal winner had no fouls.

James Beckford won the 2003 World silver in Paris, and 16 years later, Tajay Gayle took gold in Doha. The KC jumps guru thinks another gold would do Jamaica a world of good.

“It would be very encouraging, especially for the youngsters,” DeLisser said. “I think they use it as motivation, that they can do it if they put in the hard work and also for the senior jumpers, to say it can be done and hopefully it will spark a lot of great performances within the next couple of years in the jumps.”

Pinnock trained at KC during the Christmas break before returning to the University of Arkansas and coach Travis Geopfert and Delisser saw the effect the 23-year-old star had on the current school team, and not just the jumpers.

“It’s definitely motivation for them and it tells them that it’s actually real. To see somebody on TV and to see somebody in person, and watching them do the same process, it motivates them,” he said.