Yelena Slesarenko

Largely unknown before 2004, she kick started the season by clearing 2.04 metres and winning the World Indoor Championships. When the outdoor season started she won the SPAR European Cup with the same result, improving her personal best from 1.97 (achieved in 2002). She continued her good form at the 2004 Summer Olympics, winning the gold medal with a new national and personal record of 2.06 metres, beating the previous Olympic record, set by Stefka Kostadinova in 1996. After clearing 2.06 she made decent attempts at 2.10, which would have been a world record. She rounded off the season by winning the World Athletics Final.[2]

Injuries kept her away from most of the 2005 season, including the 2005 World Championships.

Early in 2006, however, she won the World Indoor Championships with 2.02 metres. She finished fifth in the 2006 European Athletics Championships, failing to clear 2.00 m.

At the 2008 Beijing Summer Olympics, Slesarenko finished fourth in the women's high jump with a jump of 2.01 meters, failing to clear 2.03 meters after three tries.[3] However, in 2016 both she and her compatriot, bronze-medalist Anna Chicherova, were disqualified from this event after failing a retest of drug samples from Beijing.[4][5]

Slesarenko retired in 2014 after a successful career,[6] and is currently a director of a winter sports academy in Volgograd, her home city.