Yaroslavl

[DoubleRBar]

Happy 45th birthday today (Wednesday) to an Olympic champion who was born on a Wednesday.

This person won Olympic gold at the age of 21.

Sara Silverman and our birthday champion were born on the same day, same month, and same year.

Our birthday athlete also owns an Olympic bronze medal in the same event.

You might be interested to know that this champion also has a World Championship gold medal, two World Championship silver medals, and two World Championship bronze medals, all in the same event.

Again, you can forget the hurdles when thinking of this person's event.

I'm pretty certain you know this gold medalist. Please name our birthday athlete for today.

[Cooter Brown]

Maksim Tarasov.

[DoubleRBar]

Well done, Cooter Brown and happy birthday today to Maksim Tarasov, winner of the Barcelona (1992) pole vault. You might remember that the reigning Olympic champion was Sergey Bubka (he had also won 3 World Championships). Bubka didn't start the final until 5.70 (18 8 1/2"), but he wasn't use to the two minute time limit for each try. After two misses at 5.70, Bubka passed to 5.75 and missed at that height. What a shock. I can still recall that moment. Anyway, Tarasov went on to clear 5.80 (19' 1/4") to win the gold medal.