Mutaz Essa Barshim

Mutaz Essa Barshim

Barshim at the 2011 Doha Diamond League meet
Personal information
Born	(1991-06-24) 24 June 1991 (age 25) Doha, Qatar
Height	1.92 m (6 ft 3 1⁄2 in)
Weight	70 kg (150 lb)
Sport
Country	Qatar
Sport	Athletics
Event(s)	High jump
Achievements and titles
Personal best(s)	Outdoor: 2.43 m (2014) Indoor: 2.41 m (2015)
Medal record Olympic Games 2016 Rio de Janeiro High jump 2012 London High jump World Championships 2013 Moscow High jump World Indoor Championships 2014 Sopot High jump Asian Athletics Championships 2011 Kobe High jump 2015 Wuhan High jump Asian Indoor Athletics Championships 2010 Tehran High jump 2012 Hangzhou High jump 2014 Hangzhou High jump Asian Games 2010 Guangzhou High jump 2014 Incheon High jump Military World Games 2011 Rio de Janeiro High jump Pan Arab Games 2011 Doha High jump Continental Cup 2014 Marrakech High jump
Updated on 9 March 2014.

Outdoor: 2.43 m (2014)

Mutaz Essa Barshim (Arabic: معتز عيسى برشم‎‎; born 24 June 1991) is a Qatari track and field athlete who specialises in the high jump. He is the national record and Asian record holder with a best mark of 2.43 m (7 ft 11 ¹⁄₂ in). He won a silver medal at the 2016 Summer Olympics in Rio de Janeiro and a bronze medal at the 2012 Summer Olympics in London. He was earlier the Asian Indoor and World Junior champion in 2010, and won the high jump gold medals at the 2011 Asian Athletics Championships and 2011 Military World Games. He jumps off his left foot, using the Fosbury Flop technique, with a pronounced backwards arch over the bar.

One of his brothers, Muamer, is also a high jumper.

Barshim gave an interview to the IAAF in April 2013 and explained how he started in the sport. Mutaz was born in Doha into a Sudanese family of 5 boys and 1 girl, where his father was a Qatari athletics competitor in middle- and long-distance races. All of the Barshim children became active in the sport of athletics (track & field) because of their father, who, after retiring from competition, became the coach of a local club. Barshim tried both running and long jumping as a youth. He told the IAAF interviewer, “I grew up, nothing special, like any kid in Qatar. I joined a club because my father was going to the club training so sometimes he used to take me there with him. I knew athletics because of my father." He attended an Arabic school in Doha, where he learned to speak English. At age 15 he switched to the high jump and quickly excelled. Soon, he was training in Doha at the ASPIRE Academy for Sports Excellence. He finished to train in ASPIRE in 2009, when his personal best was 2.14 m. It was from then, September 2009, when his new (and current) coach from Poland/Sweden arrived to Doha. He has been his coach since then, and Barshim said, "He is more than a coach, we are like father and son." During summer season in Europe, they spend time at Szczyrba's home in Warsaw, Poland, and they also train in Sweden so that Barshim does not have to waste time flying to and from Qatar between competitions.