The long jump competition at the 64th Hanžeković Memorial Meeting in Zagreb could indeed be dubbed the War of the Worlds. One world would represent two European stars, Darya Klishina and Ivana Španović and the other world, as always – a world unto itself – American Brittney Reese!
Reese was born on 9th September 1986 and with a distance of 7.23 metres, she is the indoor American record holder in the long jump. In the outdoor competition, she jumped 7.25 metres with only Marion Jones and Jackie Joyner-Kersee gaining better results in the USA. However, on a global scale, nobody has been better than her over the last five years.
Believe it or not, Brittney does not know what a Bronze or Silver medal looks like from a major competition as she has always managed to gain the Gold! At the World Championships in Berlin in 2009, she won with a distance of 7.10 metres, and the same was repeated with a distance of 6.82 metres at the World Championships in Daegu in 2011 and once again in Moscow, two years later in 2013, where she struck Gold jumping a distance of 7.01 metres. Her consistency was reflected at the World Indoor Championships: 2010 in Doha, first with 6.70 metres and in 2012 in Istanbul, hitting a record of 7.23 metres bagging yet again, another Gold medal. It goes without saying that the Gold was firmly in her sights at the London Olympics in 2012 where she jumped 7.12 metres achieving her aim.
When she’s on the field, Brittney Reese gives the impression of a certain withdrawn, quiet and modest person. Her introvert character is reflected in her following statement: “I don’t allow myself to be distracted by other people’s emotions, opinions or insecurities. If I’m happy, I know that’s the only thing that matters to me. Everyone should understand that..”
Away from competing, in her private life, Brittney stands out for her humanitarian work. In 2011 she donated 100 turkeys to the homeless in Gulfport (Mississippi), the city in which she lives, where she studied and equally where she spent her student days playing basketball.