I was originally forced to do high jump. I used to play a lot of volleyball during secondary school, so I had some hop. The track and field coach also manage the volleyball team, and when he figured I am probably his best jumper in the school, he forced me to do high jump or he is going to dismiss the volleyball team.
Over the year, I started enjoying jumping more and more, partly because of winning within the school, but I was never good enough to win nationally. I went on to study physics in my undergraduate, which I kept jumping. I did reasonably well, got a personal best at 185 cm in my freshman year. But after that, I never improved, which I was quite fustrated. Also I started to run into injuries. So when I got more and more involved in my research, I decided to bid a bitter farewell to high jump, said to myself my time was up.
Although I stayed active during graduate school, I never touched the high jump pit once in that 4 years. In my third year, I started wanting to jump again. That desire kept coming back to me, and every time more intense. Once I graduated and moved on to my postdoc in 2021, I decided to get back to it, just hoping to reach 190 cm. Did that in 2022 June, which felt like I redeem myself in a way. And since then I am improving at a rate that will put the younger me to shame. Take that, 18 years old Kaze - From 28 years old Kaze.
I want to go to the Olympics. Trust me, no one understand how crazy and unhinge this sounds more than I do. I doubt myself everytime I think about it. I am older now, I am not as talented, I don't have the best support either. Chances are differentiably small, but I want to push my limit with a goal in mind. If I can get to 230 cm, I should have a pretty good shot.
My story was