Bruno Brokken (born 9 May 1953 in Wilrijk) is a former Belgian high jumper. In 1976 he got the bronze medal at the European Indoor Championships with a jump of 2.19 meter. [1]
Bruno Brokken was the 1975 Belgian Sportsman of the year, ending the six consecutive titles for Eddy Merckx. [2]
He tried his hand at other sports like soccer, basketball and especially judo before starting with athletics. He quit as a judoka when he was 15 years old with a brown belt when his father founded Wilrijk Atletiek Club, an athletics club. After trying his hand at the javelin, he switched to the high jump. A year later, he jumped over 2.04 meter using the straddle technique.
Only seventeen years old, he won the Belgian Championships in 1971. He finished as 8th in the final of the 1974 European Championships in Athletics in Rome. [3] 1975 saw him break the Belgian indoor record with 2.21 meter and the Belgian outdoor record with 2.24 meter. After winning bronze at the 1976 European Indoors, he was selected for the 1976 Summer Olympics in Montreal, but did not compete due to a last minute knee injury. An operation on his knee failed, and his sports career was over when he was only 23 years old.
Kim Gevaert is a former sprint athlete and Olympic champion from Belgium.
Kajsa Margareta Bergqvist is a Swedish former high jumper. She won one bronze medal in the Olympic Games, one gold and two bronze medals in the World Championships in Athletics and one gold and one bronze in the European Championships. Her personal outdoor record of 2.06 m, set in Germany in 2003, is also a Swedish record. Her indoor record of 2.08 m, set at the Hochsprung mit Musik meeting in 2006, is the world indoor record.
Władysław Kozakiewicz is a retired Polish athlete who specialised in the pole vault. He is best known for winning the gold medal at the 1980 Summer Olympics in Moscow and the bras d'honneur gesture which he showed to the hostile Soviet crowd. In Poland, where the gesture was viewed as a symbol of resistance against Soviet dominance, it became known as "Kozakiewicz's gesture". In addition, he won several medals at continental level, won two Summer Universiades and broke the pole vault world record three times, twice outdoors and once indoors. He is also a ten-time Polish champion.
Dwight Edwin Stones is an American television commentator and a two-time Olympic bronze medalist and former three-time world record holder in the men's high jump. During his 16-year career, he won 19 national championships. In 1984, Stones became the first athlete to both compete and serve as an announcer at the same Olympics. Since then, he has been a color analyst for all three major networks in the United States and continues to cover track and field on television. He served as an analyst for NBC Sports coverage of Track and Field at the 2008 Summer Olympics. He is a member of the US Track Hall of Fame, the California Sports Hall of Fame, the International Jewish Sports Hall of Fame, and the Orange County Jewish Sports Hall of Fame.
Tia Hellebaut is a retired Belgian track and field athlete, as well as a chemist, who started out in her sports career in the heptathlon, and afterwards specialized in the high jump event. She has cleared 2.05 metres both indoors and outdoors.
István Major was a Hungarian high jumper. He won four medals at the European Indoor Championships between 1971 and 1974, as well as two silver medals at the Universiade. His best Olympic performance was a sixth place in 1972.
Antonietta Di Martino is a retired Italian high jumper. She currently holds the Italian national women's high jump record at 2.03 metres for outdoor events and 2.04 metres for indoor events. She also currently holds the women's all-time highest jump-differential, meaning she has jumped the highest more than her own height.
William Van Dijck is a Belgian former athlete, primarily active on the 3000m steeplechase.
Jacques Borlée is a former Belgian athlete, and the father and coach of athletes Olivia Borlée, Kevin, Jonathan and Dylan Borlée. He was voted European Athletics Coach of the Year in 2011.
Nafissatou "Nafi" Thiam is a Belgian athlete specialising in multi-event competition. She is a two-time Olympic gold medalist, winning the heptathlon event at the 2016 Rio and 2020 Tokyo Olympics. Thiam is the only Belgian athlete, male or female, to successfully defend an Olympic title and only the second woman after Jackie Joyner-Kersee to win back-to-back Olympic titles in the event.
Chloé Henry is a Belgian gymnast and pole vaulter. She is multiple times Belgian Champion and National Record holder in pole vault. She is also known for her participation in Ninja Warrior France season 2. She made it to the semi-final where she became the last woman standing, just missing out on the finals.
Rune Almén is a former Swedish track and field athlete who competed in the high jump.
Douwe Jorn Amels is a Dutch track and field athlete who specialises in the high jump. He won the gold medal at the 2023 European Indoor Championships, becoming the first Dutchman ever to win gold in the event and the first Dutch high jump medallist at these championships since 1977. Amels claimed also gold at the 2013 European Under-23 Championships.
Fabian Florant is a Dominican born Dutch triple jumper. Florant qualified to compete at the 2016 Summer Olympics in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil in the men's triple jump.
The Belgian Athletics Championships is an annual outdoor track and field competition organised by the Royal Belgian Athletics League, which serves as the national championship for the sport in Belgium.
The Belgian Indoor Athletics Championships is an annual indoor track and field competition organised by the Royal Belgian Athletics League, which serves as the Belgian national championship for the sport. Typically held over two to three days in February during the Belgian winter, it was first added to the national calendar in 1989, supplementing the main outdoor Belgian Athletics Championships held in the summer since 1889. National championships in relay and combined track and field events are contested separately.
The Dutch Indoor Athletics Championships is an annual indoor track and field competition organised by the Royal Dutch Athletics Federation, which serves as the national championship for the sport in the Netherlands. Typically held over two to three days in February during the Dutch winter, it was first added to the national calendar in 1969, supplementing the main outdoor Dutch Athletics Championships held in the summer since 1910.
Isaac Kimeli is a Kenyan born Belgian middle- and long-distance runner. He won the silver medal in the 3000 metres at the European Indoor Championships. Kimeli earned a silver in the 5000 metres at the European U23 Championships. He took four individual medals at the European Cross Country Championships.
Jochem Dobber is a Dutch track and field sprint athlete who specialises in the 400 metres. He was a gold medallist in the 4 × 400 metres relay with the Dutch team at the 2021 European Athletics Indoor Championships, setting a Dutch record.
Britt Weerman is a Dutch track and field athlete who competes in the high jump.