Coming just three weeks before the start of Paris 2024, Sunday's Wanda Diamond League meeting in the French capital was effectively an Olympic dress rehearsal, and hopes were high of another historic day at the Stade Charléty.
In 2023, Paris had delivered two world records in a single evening as Faith Kipyegon and Lamecha Girma stormed to glory in the 5000m and 3000m steeplechase. With Kipyegon back in town to launch her title defence in the 1500m and Mondo Duplantis eyeing another attack on 6.25m in the pole vault, the stage seemed set for more of the same in 2024.
As it turned out, Sunday's world-record moment came from another discipline entirely, as Yaroslava Mahuchikh added a golden streak of Ukrainian yellow to the blue of the Stade Charléty track, confounding expectations to clear a world record 2.10m in the women's high jump.
By the time she got to the world record mark, reigning Diamond League champion Mahuchikh had already delivered a thrilling battle with Australian rival Nicola Olyslagers.
The two women had both taken two attempts to clear 1.95m and 2.01m, before Mahuchikh ultimately pulled clear at 2.03m. Having secured victory, she then set her sights on a personal best and national record of 2.07m.
When she sailed over that height with her second jump, the Ukrainian knew she was onto something really special.
"The 2.07m jump felt so easy and I felt this atmosphere. My coach said maybe I should stop there, but I said no: I want to try for the world record," she said after the meeting.
Her gut feeling proved to be right. In the minutes that followed, the Wanda Diamond League's official timekeeper OMEGA raised the bar to 2.10m, and Mahuchikh cleared the height at her first attempt. In the blink of an eye, she had broken a world record which had previously stood for 37 years, and delivered the OMEGA Moment of the Meeting in Paris.
"For the last two years, I've believed I can do it. In my mind, I was so strong and I thought: why not?" said Mahuchikh, before setting her sights on even more glory at the Olympics later this summer "I am excited because this has started before the Olympic Games. It's a great step."
As if Mahuchikh's exploits weren't enough, Kipyegon then followed up with her own world record in the 1500m, breaking her own previous record with a jaw-dropping 3:49.04. After Paris and Eugene last season, it was the third time ever that two world records had been broken at a single Diamond League meeting.
