Qatari high jumper Mutaz Essa Barshim keeps raising the bar

HANGZHOU – It is no surprise that everyone wants a piece of Mutaz Essa Barshim.

He is one of the biggest stars at the Asian Games track and field competition, with high jump gold at the 2020 Tokyo Olympic Games and three world championships crowns.

As the Qatari made his way through the media mixed zone at the Hangzhou Olympic Sports Centre on Monday, he was stopped constantly with requests for interviews.

And the affable athlete, who had just completed the qualification round, obliged and stopped for all comers, fielding questions from at least five different publications.

Barshim may make winning look easy, but time spent in interviews leaves less for training, resting and improving.

But that is who he is, giving himself to everything, even if it makes things more challenging.

“Winning is very difficult,” Barshim told The Straits Times. “But maintaining winning for so long is near impossible because of the focus (needed) and all the distractions.”

When he was younger, he could go to the stadium, train and then return home, but the routine is vastly different now with more commitments off the track, he noted.

The 32-year-old said: “Of course, it’s more spotlight, more money... but with all that comes more pressure, more responsibilities that you have to fulfil, which affects your actual training.

“You cannot find the actual time to train the amount you want, or you don’t have the actual time to have the recovery that you want, so it’s getting more and more difficult the more successful you are.

“Now I’m at a place in my career where I have so much respect for athletes who have longevity in their career. To stay at the top for so long, it’s really something that I appreciate.”

The two-time Asian Games champion’s journey has not been without its challenges. In 2018, he twisted his ankle while attempting a world record jump, an injury that nearly ended his career.

That is why his title from the 2019 Doha world championships is the one he treasures most.

He said: “It was almost 90 per cent that my career was over but the crowd and everyone out there – my team, my family, I came back from a very dark place, and not only coming back to jumping, but winning and defending my title.

“Being the only high jumper to do that in history is just different.”

Even as he keeps raising the bar, Barshim has kept his feet firmly on the ground.

He also shares camaraderie and friendship with his fellow jumpers. At the Tokyo Games, he and Italian Gianmarco Tamberi agreed to share the gold medal, deciding to forgo the jump-off after they both failed to clear 2.39m.

On Monday, he posed for a photo with his closest challenger, South Korea’s Woo Sang-hyeok, the 2022 world championships runner-up. The men’s high jump final is on Wednesday.

In 2022, Singapore high jumper Kampton Kam unexpectedly received a call from Barshim, who was getting in touch to send him some caps from his personal brand.

What keeps Barshim going is his love for competition.

He said: “Sport is my passion and I’m fortunate enough to turn my passion to be my job. As I said, I love challenges.

“I’ve been doing this for so long, I could have just stayed home, retired and enjoy the fruits of my labour, but that’s not what I’m looking for.

“I’m always looking forward to putting myself in an uncomfortable situation because I believe that’s the only way we can improve as humans in general.

“And in sport, if you don’t have challenges, I don’t think you can take it to the next level.”

One goal he is still chasing is Cuban Javier Sotomayor’s 30-year-old world record of 2.45m. Barshim’s personal best is 2.43m.

He said: “For me, I don’t look at myself like there’s one competition and I’m done.

“Before I retire, I want to do the most possible... I want to be the world record holder.”