Juan Miguel Echevarria in the long jump at the IAAF World Indoor Tour meeting in Karlsruhe (© Jiro Mochizuki)
World indoor long jump champion Juan Miguel Echevarria will be among the key headliners at the Indoor Meeting Karslruhe, the second competition of the six-meeting IAAF World Indoor Tour, on 2 February.
One year ago, the young Cuban kicked off what turned out to be a sensational 2018 season with a victory in Karlsruhe, just four weeks before his upset triumph at the IAAF World Indoor Championships Birmingham 2018. He later went on to produce a stellar outdoor campaign, capped by an 8.68m personal best and a barely wind-aided 8.83m leap at the IAAF Diamond League stop in Stockholm, the longest jump in the world in 20 years.
With his appearance at the Birmingham leg of the World Indoor Tour previously confirmed, Echevarria will be a strong favourite for the Tour title in the long jump, one of the scoring events in 2019, an accolade which brings, atop of the series US$20,000 first place prize, a wildcard berth for the 2021 World Indoor Championships in Nanjing.
Echevarria, now 20, will take on Germans Fabian Heinle, who leapt to silver at the European Championships last August, and Karslruhe's hometown hero Julian Howard, a four-time national champion in the event, who is looking to move on from a disappointing outing at last summer's European Championships.
Other athletes already announced for the meeting, which has already sold out, include Olympic pole vault champion Ekaterini Stefanidi of Greece, high jumpers Mateusz Przybylko of Germany and Italy's Gianmarco Tamberi, and European 3000m steeplechase champion Gesa Felicitas Krause.
Bob Ramsak and organisers for the IAAF
