Havana/The triple jumper Davisleydi Velazco This Sunday he was two centimeters away from the triple jump title at the World Athletics Ultimate Championship in Budapest. With a record of 15.04 meters, she won second place and achieved it, as she herself declared, “representing and putting Cuba at the top.” His compatriot Leyanis Pérez won third place with a mark of 14.90 meters. The Island took 2-3 in an event won by Senegalese Saly Sarr (15.06 meters).
“Cuba is my country, where I grew up, where I was born… So it will always be a pride and a pleasure to be able to compete with the country in which I was born and raised,” Velazco told the magazine. Olympics.
For Velazco it also represented the closing of a very complicated season. “I really thought I wasn’t going to be able to get here,” recognizes in conversation with Deporcuba the athlete who lives in Puerto Rico and who was disdained in 2023 by the National Athletics Commission and the Cuban Athletics Federation just for leaving the Island to improve her competitive level.
For almost three years, the athlete kept training “without help, without sponsorship, without anything” under the orders of also Cuban Ubaldo Duany, who directed the Colombian Caterine Ibargüen, Olympic champion in Rio 2016. This is how she achieved qualification for the World Athletics Ultimate Championship.
With the guidance of Duany, the triple jumper achieved a jump of 15.13 meters this season, becoming the third Cuban woman who has made the most flown in triple jump in history.
The one born in Camagüey secured a prize of 75,000 dollars in an event that did not distribute medals and brought together the best in athletics
“I have had to pay for everything, my trips, everything… So, it has been a very hard year, away from my family and it was worth it,” Velazco emphasizes to the portal. Deporcuba who closely followed the incidents of the Cuban competitors in Budapest.
The one born in Camagüey secured a prize of $75,000 in an event that did not distribute medals and brought together the Olympic champions of Paris 2024, the world champions of Tokyo 2025, the winners of the 2026 Diamond League Final and the best positioned in the ranking world.
The third step went to Leyanis Pérez and with it an incentive of $40,000, which after the 4% tax that the regime applies to personal income for individual prizes in international events and the 15% distributed to the coach and another 5% for specialists and medical support personnel, the athlete is left with $30,400.
Pérez, the current world champion and dominator of the event since the injury of the world record holder, Yulimar Rojas (2024), accurate Olympics“he competed with discomfort in his hamstrings (muscles located at the back of the thigh), which is why he decided not to jump in the last attempt.”
“I had to retire earlier because a minor thing is better than a serious thing. I still have a lot of time, a lot of experiences to live,” he declared.
