JOHANNESBURG - Olympic long jump silver medallist Luvo Manyonga leapt to a new South African record with a first attempt of 8.62m at the Athletics Gauteng North Championships in Pretoria on Friday night.
Manyonga launched the mammoth leap on his first attempt improving Khotso Mokoena's record by 12 centimetres.
When Manyonga saw the distance he screamed in celebration before he did his signature backflip.
“It was perfect jumping…I was expecting an SA record today but I wasn't expecting the distance so it feels good,” Manyonga said.
“It is now time to change the long jump game, it has been a long time that no-one has come close to nine metres.”
The jump ranks Manyonga joint 12th with Jamaican on the world all-time list and the longest since June 2009.
With the jump Manyonga is edging closer to American Mike Powell’s world record of 8.95m he set back in 1991.
Manyonga once again produced an impressive and faultless sequence of jumps of 8.62m, 8.29m, 8.34m and 8.34m before he retired due to an ankle niggle.
“I’m very happy with my performance today because everything was on the board, so there is progress in my jumping,” Manyonga said.
Manyonga have threatened Mokoena’s record since he won the Olympic silver medal with a distance of 8.37m.
At the Brussels Diamond League meeting after the Games, Manyonga came within four centimetres of Mokoena’s record with a jump of 8.46m.
A week ago Manyonga made the strongest indication that he was on the cusp of uncorking something special.
Luvo Manyonga launches a new SA record of 8.62m on his first jump at AGN Champs. #trackandfield pic.twitter.com/rglsnIHELP
— Ockert de Villiers (@ockertde) March 17, 2017
At the Bloemfontein Speed Series in Bloemfontein he recorded an impressive sequence of 8.37m, 8.27m, 8.39m and 8.46m.
Manyonga’s coach Neil Cornelius said he expected his charge to break the national record although they did not plan for a jump of this distance.
“I am really happy and really impressed, we didn’t really go out for a big distance today but to just get a jump in,” Cornelius said.
“I am more than happy with his jumps, I have a reason to be smiling, I was expecting something over 8.50m but an 8.62m really surprised me.”
Cornelius was delighted with Manyonga’s sequence of jumps with the 25-year-old jumping nothing shorter than 8.30m.
New South African record-holder Luvo Manyonga Photo: BackpagePix
“That really makes me excited because his worst jump was an 8.30m, so if that is his worst jump I am really excited for what the next few meetings will bring,” Cornelius said.
“We are doing a lot more jumps now, so we still need to work on the technique and the approach but so far we are just going to follow the same programme and the same plan.”
Cornelius said they have not made any real attempts to reach big distances where Manyonga have been taking “it easy”.
Later in the evening 17-year-old Sokwakhana Zazini posted a new world youth best in the 400m hurdles when he crossed the line in a time of 48.84 seconds improving previous global mark by 0.17 seconds.