MOLLY CAUDERY will be jumping for joy at the Olympics if she can carry her red-hot pole vaulting form into Paris.
And her dream of a medal this summer could come true less than three years after virtually losing her finger in a freak accident at home.
Born in Cornwall in March 2000, the new darling of British athletics is enjoying a simply astonishing rise – both on the field and online.
Caudery, 23, hit the headlines with her silver medal at the 2022 Commonwealth Games – four years on from her fifth-placed finish as an 18-year-old on the Gold Coast in Australia.
Incredibly, though, just eight months earlier, a shocking injury in her home gym almost ended her pole vault career before it got off the ground.
Caudery, who sports a scar on her index finger, said: “I was doing snatching and, as I brought the bar down, my finger caught between where you rack it and the bar.
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“It was 90 per cent off. It was holding on by the skin on the side.
“Three surgeries later, it is all good. But since then, I had two Achilles surgeries, which put me out for almost nine months.
“That was a pretty big setback that I managed to come back from.”
That final sentence is an understatement.
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Since that Commonwealth silver, Caudery has literally jumped to new heights, setting two PBs on the same day to claim the British Championships title in July 2023.
That gained her automatic entry into the Worlds the following month, where she came fifth with her new record of 4.75m.
The Loughborough University sports science graduate backed that up as she claimed the UK Indoor title with a 4.85m.
And with her PB now at 4.86m, she heads into the World Indoor Championships in Glasgow as the leading pole vaulter this season.
So with Paris 2024 just around the corner, it is little wonder she is dreaming of a medal – just like her Team GB team-mate and Loughborough pal Holly Bradshaw, who claimed bronze in Tokyo three years ago.
After all, Bradshaw jumped 4.85m for her bronze, with 4.90m the gold-medal height.
Caudery added ahead of the Glasgow meet: “It’s every athlete’s dream to get an Olympic medal.
“If I can just get to the final in Paris then you never know what is going to happen.
“Every athlete has their timeline and mine was always 2028.
“But I know that what I’ve jumped so far could be pushing towards those medal areas, so I do think I need to re-evaluate. It’s crazy to think that that could put me up there.
“To go from my PB being 4.60 at the beginning of last year to 4.86 already this year, it’s all happened very quickly for me.
“I took so much confidence from last year and I’ve improved physically and mentally and I think that’s just taken me to the next step.
“Coming into the season, a world indoors medal was not a clear target. But now I can’t shy away from the fact that I’ve been consistently jumping 4.80.
“If I can keep doing what I’m doing, a medal could be on the cards and that’s exciting.”
It is little wonder adidas snapped talented Caudery up early in 2024 as she put pen to paper on her first kit contract.
The sportswear giants undoubtedly spotted the huge potential of their new client, too, given her sudden explosion of popularity online.
Her combination of athletics posts, worldwide holiday snaps, glamorous selfies, bikini pics and doting content with her fellow British athlete boyfriend, high jumper Joel Clarke Khan, proves to be a winning formula.
Caudery has ticked off South Africa, Indonesia, Greece, the Canary Islands, Florida and The Bahamas – with the incredible photos going down a storm with supporters.
Like her jumps, the followers count is going through the roof and now stands at a new PB of more than 205,000.
And it shows no signs of letting up, either.
The aspiring baker, keen traveller and part-time surfer – who has had to put her thrill-seeking skydiving on pause during her athletics career – is riding the wave and taking the fame in her stride, though.
And while she denied suggestions she is also a model, reflecting on the social media stardom, Caudery said: “I don’t know where it really came from.
“More recently, I’ve been posting a lot of pole vault videos and I’m getting like 10,000 more followers just from that.
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“’I think having that following is super important. People have said that athletics is not quite as big as it used to be.
“So if I can inspire one person from the next generation, let alone the 200,000 or so who follow me, to be a part of athletics and keep it going, then that would be great.”
Source: Athletics - thesun.co.uk
