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Isinbayeva sets her sights on eclipsing Bubka
(Reuters)
Updated: 2006-03-10 14:19
MOSCOW, March 9 (Reuters) - World and Olympic pole vault champion Yelena
Isinbayeva wants to leave her mark with sports fans around the globe.
Olympic and world
pole vault champion Yelena Isinbayeva of Russia laughs as she celebrates
her victory after setting a new world record at the annual meeting
organised by the great Ukrainian men's pole vaulter Sergei Bubka in
Donetsk, Ukraine February 12, 2006.
[Reuters] | "I want to be remembered not
just as any world or Olympic champion but as a person who has broken more world
records than anyone else," the Russian told reporters on the eve of the world
indoor championships.
"If you break a world record, then you stay in people's memory forever and I
want to be remembered forever."
Isinbayeva will be chasing her 20th world record in Moscow and wants to
better the great Sergei Bubka's total tally of 35.
"That's my goal," she said.
More than a dozen world and Olympic champions will be competing at the
15,000-seat Olympic Sports Complex over the weekend but the biggest draw will be
the bubbly 23-year-old Isinbayeva.
With thousands of posters using her image plastered all over the city,
Isinbayeva takes her fame in her stride.
"I don't mind it at all. I love the attention," said the beaming Volgograd
native.
"If they had some plain posters, people in Moscow might not attend the event
but if people see some great champions on it, they know who is competing and
would come to watch us compete."
Lamine Diack, president of the International Association of Athletics
Federations, called Isinbayeva the main attraction of the championships. "She
should help lift the gloom of the winter months," Diack said.
Asked if she would have any added pressure competing on home soil, Isinbayeva
said: "Not at all. I'm looking forward to it, even if Moscow is not my home
city.
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