2024 Paris Olympics Preview: Women’s Field Events, Athletes, and Storylines to Watch

With one day to go until track and field action gets underway, we’ve got one more preview for you as you get hyped up for Olympic competition. The women’s field events are shaping up to be true battles for gold among some of the sport’s all time greats, from reigning champs Valarie Allman in the discus to Malaika Mihambo in the long jump to rising stars like Sarah Mitton in the shot put and Anna Hall in the heptathlon.

A full schedule of events with live results can be found here. You can also find a searchable list of entries and a helpful FAQ on the World Athletics website.

In the United States, track and field events will be broadcast on Peacock (subscription required) and the NBC/Universal family of TV stations. A full broadcast schedule can be found here. If you don’t live in the U.S. and want to watch, more information on international broadcasts can be found here.

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Without further ado, here’s everything you need to know about the women’s field events at the Paris Olympics. 

Women’s Shot Put

First round: Thursday, August 8th, 4:25 a.m. ET

The much-awaited Olympic debut of two-time World champion Chase Jackson will be the main headline as the competition draws nearer, but the depth of this event is so impressive that she is far from an obvious favorite. That’s no knock on Jackson, who’s thrown 20m in six competitions this year and has only lost once in the last three months, but she’s still only fourth on the world list this year with a mark of 20.10m.

Top contenders: Sarah Mitton finished 28th in Tokyo. Now a World Indoor champion and one of the 10 best throwers of the last two decades, I think it’s safe to say she’ll do a bit better this year. The highlight of the Canadian’s outdoor campaign was a huge throw of 20.68m in May, but it’s been a very strong summer all throughout for Mitton. On the other end of the Olympic success spectrum from Mitton is China’s Gong Lijiao. Now at her staggering fifth games, Gong will be aiming to join the legendary Valerie Adams with four medals, the most in Olympic shot put history. Given that she has medalled at every outdoor global championships since the Beijing Olympics aside from a fourth-place finish in Rio, I’m not gonna say that’s out of the cards. 

More names to watch: Jessica Schilder of the Netherlands has been stellar this year, throwing 20.31m indoors and 20.33m in her most recent outdoor competition – a win over both Jackson and Gong. Tokyo silver medallist Raven Saunders is back from a whereabouts suspension that kept them out of competition in 2023 and had a great showing at the U.S. Trials (19.90m) to insert themselves back into the medal conversation. New Zealand’s Maddison-Lee Wesche always performs her best at global championships, and she just hit a PB of 19.81m last week. Jaida Ross tore apart the NCAA record books this spring and has carried that momentum into the summer. Just one of seven Americans to ever break the 20m barrier, the former Oregon Duck will undoubtedly be looking for a medal in her senior national team debut.

Women’s Discus Throw

First round: Friday, August 2nd, 12:55 p.m. ET

This event is in the same situation it’s been in each of the last two years headed into World Champs: reigning Olympic champ Valarie Allman has been the best, most consistent thrower in the world by a significant margin. Still, the American came up just short of the World title in 2022 and 2023. It wasn’t an issue of Allman performing poorly – 68.30m and 69.23m are massive marks – it was that one of her peers happened to have the competition of their lives on the biggest stage. Eventually that trend has to break. Right?

Top contenders: This section, unfortunately, requires a huge disclaimer. 2019 World champion Yaime Pérez, who entered the top 10 in the event’s history with a mark of 73.09m in April, won’t be in Paris. Pérez defected from Cuba following the 2022 World Championships and has been living and training in Pennsylvania since. Unfortunately, she was unable to get on the IOC Refugee Olympic team this year and won’t be able to represent the U.S. until at least next year. Were she to be in Paris, Pérez is an obvious pick to win silver in what would have been her fourth Olympics.

With Pérez excluded, Allman has the seven best marks in the world this year and has thrown exactly three meters farther than any other woman in the world. We know that all this means nothing until these women actually step in the ring, but Allman is at the very least a heavy favorite to defend her title.

More names to watch: The battles for silver and bronze will be fascinating, as there are a handful of women who could end up in either of those positions. 2022 World champion Bin Feng of China has had a strong season, having broken 67m in each of her last six competitions. Serbia’s Sandra Elkasevic, who won the Olympic title in both London and Rio, has continued to punch Father Time in the face this year, winning her seventh European crown last month. The Dutch duo of Jorinde van Klinken and Alida van Daalen, who are both also entered in shot put, have each put together very strong and consistent seasons to push themselves into the medal conversation.

Women’s Javelin

First round: Wednesday, August 7th, 4:25 a.m. ET 

No woman has won back-to-back global titles in this event since world record holder Barbora Špotáková in 2011 and 2012. In other words, this event is always hella open. Budapest World champ Haruka Kitaguchi has had a great season, but she’s only fifth on the world list this year and most recently took fourth in London against some of her biggest competitors. However, a week earlier in Monaco she hit a season’s best of 65.21m to beat out many of those same women. There are so many excellent competitors in this event that it will simply come down to who has the best stuff when it matters most. 

Top contenders: Last year’s silver medallist Flor Denis Ruiz Hurtado has been the world leader for much of 2024 thanks to her 66.70m mark from mid-May, but it will have been almost three months since her last competition by the time the qualifying round gets underway. These will be the third Olympics for the 33-year-old Colombian after missing out on Tokyo. The final member of the Budapest podium, Australia’s Mackenzie Little, is entering her second Olympics with more momentum than anyone else in the field. Her last two competitions have produced the third-best and best marks of her life, hitting 66.27m to win in London and move her to second on the world list for 2024. 

More names to watch: Victoria Hudson of Austria has followed up somewhat of a breakout campaign in 2023 with a strong Olympic year. She’s had three competitions with a mark that would have been good enough to medal in Tokyo, including a 66.06m Austrian record from May and 64.62m to win the European title in June. Maggie Malone-Hardin made her fifth Team USA last month and is the lone American representative in this event, but she’s only made one final in her previous four major championships. She’s had several strong showings so far in 2024 and could be a contender to win the first Olympic medal for the U.S. in this event since 1976. Adriana Vilagoš, already a two-time European silver medallist, will look to continue what has been a great season with her first Olympic appearance. The 20-year-old already has seven of the eight best throws in Serbian history.

Women’s Hammer Throw

First round: Sunday, August 4th, 4:20 a.m. ET

For the first time in a long time, Anita Włodarczyk will not be entering the Olympics as the favorite. The Polish icon, who has won half of the Olympic golds ever handed out in this event, is still in impressive form, especially given her age and injury history, but even making the final at what will be her fifth Games would be a pleasant surprise for her fans. Add in the absences of 2022 World champ and world leader Brooke Andersen and two-time World Championship medallist Janee’ Kassanavoid after mishaps at the U.S. Trials, and this field looks very different from years past.

Top contenders: With Andersen and Kassanavoid out of the picture, reigning World champion Camryn Rogers becomes a bonafide lock to land on the podium. Rogers has been strong and consistent all year, posting two of the three best throws in the world this year with marks of 77.76m on two occasions. Despite this being only her second year as a professional, she’s already proven championship mettle time and time again and is a safe bet to improve upon her fifth-place finish from Tokyo. DeAnna Price was able to withstand the chaos of the U.S. Trials and made her third Olympic team. It’s been business as usual for the 2019 World champ, who has four of the nine best marks in the world this year. However, it’s hard to disregard what happened in 2021: Price threw 80.31m at the Trials, the best throw ever by anyone not named Włodarczyk, but managed only eighth in Tokyo. If she can shake off that memory and be the same DeAnna Price we know she can be, she could have a great shot at winning the first Olympic medal by an American in this event’s history. 

More names to watch: Behind the two favorites, the battle for bronze should have several significant contenders. Zalina Marghieva has the third best mark in the field this year, throwing 75.95m in May, but her best mark since then is only 71.33m and she was only able to finish sixth at the European Championship. If she can land on the podium, it would be Moldova’s first ever Olympic medal in track and field. After having her first Olympic appearance robbed from her while representing Nigeria in 2021, U.S. Trials champion Annette Echikunwoke is ready to make her debut on the sport’s biggest stage and has a chance to make it three straight global championships with multiple American medals in this event.

Women’s Long Jump

First round: Tuesday, August 6th, 5:15 a.m. ET

Tara Davis-Woodhall vs. Malaika Mihambo against the backdrop of the Olympic Games. Can it get any better than this? Davis-Woodhall, the World Indoor champ from Glasgow with showmanship for days, and Mihambo, the reigning Olympic champion, have been the best in the world all year and will finally be facing off – for only the third time ever – next week. While they’re rightfully the favorites as the only two women over 7m this year, they are far from the only women in the field that warrant recognition.

Top contenders: In terms of deciding between Davis-Woodhall and Mihambo for the definitive title of “gold medal favorite,” there are lots of factors to consider. Mihambo has the world lead after jumping 7.22m into a -1.4m/s headwind to win the European title in June. Davis-Woodhall sits right behind her with an indoor mark of 7.18m, but she’s also jumped 7.16m and 7.14m outdoors. Davis-Woodhall is undefeated and has broken 7m in her last five competitions in a row, while Mihambo has only done so once and recently finished seventh at the Paris Diamond League (granted that was coming off a bout of COVID). The ace up Mihambo’s sleeve is that she’s won the last three global finals she’s competed in. Woodhall-Davis has shown in Budapest and Glasgow that she can step up to the plate in a similar fashion, but it’ll be a tall task to prevent Mihambo from becoming the first woman in history to defend the Olympic long jump crown.

More names to watch: Let’s talk about the reigning World champion, Ivana Spánovic. Just a week out from competing in her fifth Olympics, the Serbian legend sits T-259th in the world this year with a season’s best of 6.29m. She didn’t open her season until July 7th after dealing with a minor injury flare-up during the indoor season, but she feels confident despite the fact that her two results this year are not necessarily inspiring. In an interview with European Athletics last month, she said she feels she can jump 7.30m, which could (but is not a guarantee with the two favorites in the field) win her the elusive Olympic gold, the last title missing from her trophy case. Behind Mihambo and Davis-Woodhall, a trio of youngsters hold the next three best jumps this year: 23-year-old American Jasmine Moore (6.98m), 19-year-old Bulgarian Plamena Mitkova (6.97m), and 22-year-old Italian Larissa Iapichino (6.94m). Moore is jumping her best in her most recent competitions and will be contesting both the long and triple jumps for the third straight global championship. Iapichino has been jumping as consistently as ever and will be looking to improve upon her fifth-place finish from Budapest. Mitkova is a very interesting case, as she has improved by almost half-a-meter in 2024 and took second at the Paris Diamond League with a wind-aided 6.78m jump, beating out eight other Olympians including Mihambo and Spánovic. 

Women’s Triple Jump

First round: Friday, August 2nd, 12:15 p.m. ET

For the first time since 2017, the field will step onto a runway not cast in the shadow of Yulimar Rojas, and they’ve gotta be feeling pretty good about that. Prior to opting not to compete this indoor season, the 28-year-old Venezuelan had won every indoor or outdoor world title since London 2017, and she usually hasn’t let it stay particularly close. Unfortunately, Rojas tore her Achilles during training in April and will miss the chance to defend her Olympic crown. With that opening at the top of the podium, there are a handful of women that will be in an incredibly entertaining dogfight for Olympic glory. 

Top contenders: Thea Lafond of Dominica was the woman who capitalized on Rojas’s absence in Glasgow, becoming the 10th woman to break the 15m barrier indoors with her winning mark of 15.01m. That still stands as the world lead now that we’re on the precipice of the games, and a 14.87m performance at the Monaco Diamond League three weeks ago shows that Lafond is still in that kind of shape despite a mediocre (by her standards) start to her outdoor season. Despite winning the indoor title, the slight edge has to go to the silver medallist from Glasgow, 22-year-old Cuban Leyanis Pérez-Hernández. She is undefeated outdoors, including three Diamond League wins, and jumped a wind-aided 15.16m in late June. That mark ties her at 15th on the all-time all-conditions list, and given the form she’s shown this summer it shouldn’t be a surprise if she can produce a mark that impressive under legal conditions in Paris.

More names to watch: Ana Peleteiro-Compaoré is the only returning medallist from Tokyo, and seemed to be in a great spot to make the podium again after a bronze medal in Glasgow. However, her outdoor season has been somewhat alarming, only having one competition over 14.36m. Now that one outlier competition was winning the European title by jumping 14.85m into a headwind, so maybe I’m making a mountain out of a molehill and she’ll find a way to perform when the time is right. Paris will mark the third Olympics in the career of Maryna Bekh-Romanchuk, but the first for the Ukrainian in triple jump. After contesting both triple and long jumps at the past two World Championships, she is focusing on the event she picked up a silver in last year. Her season started later than most, but 14.81m as her opener and only mark of the season in Monaco is pretty encouraging moving into Paris. 

Women’s High Jump

First round: Friday, August 2nd, 4:15 a.m. ET

After Nicola Olyslagers won the World Indoor title in Glasgow, it looked like there was a world where Yaroslava Mahuchikh wasn’t the heavy favorite in her second Olympic Games. That belief held true up until July 7th, when just seven miles away from the Olympic Stadium, Mahuchikh broke the then-36-year-old world record of 2.09m with a first-time clearance at 2.10m. Olyslagers is still phenomenal, and this is by no means a knock on her, but Mahuchikh is just crazy.

Top contenders: That loss in Glasgow is the only one on Mahuchikh’s resume this year and the only competition in which the 22-year-old Ukrainian has failed to clear at least 2.00m. She is a buzzsaw who has proven time and time again that she can deliver on the biggest stage. The odds of Mahuchikh winning the first Olympic title in the rich history of Ukrainian high jumping is, well… high. Olyslagers, who is the only other woman in the world this year to have cleared a bar higher than 2m (a feat she’s accomplished three times), is an easy pick to repeat her silver medal from Tokyo. 

More names to watch: This is where the field gets very interesting. Behind Mahuchikh and Olyslagers, two other women in Paris have cleared 2.00m this year: collegians Rachel Glenn of the U.S. and Arkansas and Lamara Distin of Jamaica and Texas A&M. Both women cleared that barrier during the indoor season, becoming the first NCAA athletes to do so in collegiate competition. The outdoor season has had some ups and downs for the SEC rivals, but their most recent marks of 1.95m for Distin and 1.94m for Glenn show they could be medal threats if they can put it all together. 19-year-old Serb Angelina Topić has been so good all year, with two clearances at 1.98m and two more at 1.97m. The only women she has lost to outdoors are Mahuchikh twice and Olyslagers once. That’s not a bad spot to be in as she aims to win only the second global medal by a Serbian high jumper ever. 

Women’s Pole Vault

First round: Monday, August 5th, 4:40 a.m. ET

Katie Moon will take to the runway in Stade de France looking to join Yelena Isinbayeva as the only other woman to win four straight outdoor global pole vault titles. But this season has been anything but a cakewalk for Moon and that will surely continue into the Olympic final, due in no small part to the quality of the field. 

Top contenders: Reigning co-World champ Nina Kennedy has been jumping well all year after passing on the indoor season. Her only loss came back in early May to World Indoor champ Molly Caudery (more on her in a second) on countback at the Doha Diamond League. If you’re looking for who has the most momentum heading into the Olympics, Kennedy is the easy choice. She closed out July with two wins over fields that will almost mirror the Olympic final in Monaco and London, posting marks of 4.88m and 4.85m. Caudery, on the other hand, is the world leader after clearing 4.92m at a meet in France in June. She has over a third of the global performances over 4.80m this and looks to be on the perfect trajectory to sweep the global titles in 2024 at only 24 years old.

Moon’s season was derailed early by an Achilles injury she picked up during the indoor season. A 4.85m clearance in early June shows she still can be the Katie Moon we’ve gotten used to seeing over the last four years despite slightly concerning finishes in Monaco and London. Moon is a rare breed of championship performer, and even thinking about counting her out because of a few shaky Diamond Leagues is ill-advised.

More names to watch: Angelica Moser of Switzerland has been at every outdoor global championship since Beijing 2015, when she was just 17 years old. Now 26, she has had a breakthrough season. She finished fourth in Glasgow by equalling her PB of 4.75m, then won the European title in June with a new PB of 4.78m, then hit a huge PB of 4.88m in Monaco to finish second behind only Kennedy on countback. If she could pull out the gold, it would be the first for the Swiss in track and field. A medal of any color would be only Switzerland’s ninth Olympic track and field medal and their first in 40 years. Eliza McCartney took silver in Glasgow but hasn’t looked at her best throughout the summer. The New Zealander won bronze in Rio, but unfortunately was forced to miss Tokyo with an Achilles injury.  

Heptathlon

Day 1: Thursday, August 8th, 4:05 a.m. ET

The heptathlon could be an absolute battle of the titans if everyone gets to the start line fully healthy. Combined eventers are always operating on the edge and there have been numerous injuries, but all the top contenders are – knock on wood – healthy, as far as we know. Accordingly, we could see more than one athlete passing the magic 7,000 point barrier.

Top Contenders: After Belgian defending Olympic Champion Nafi Thiam’s incredible performance at the European Championships, she has laid to rest any doubts about her fitness. Having missed last year with injury, she comes to Paris as the prohibitive favorite, particularly having run a significant personal best in perhaps her weakest event, the 800m. Of course GB’s World Champion Katarina Johnson-Thompson, who pulled out after a poor start in Rome, has quietly been putting together some solid performances across a few individual events including her fastest 200m since 2019. Team USA’s Anna Hall continues to build on her return from surgery with season’s bests each time she competes but will need to be back to her all-time best to beat the likes of Thiam. 

More names to watch: World bronze medallist Anouk Vetter (Netherlands) is always a huge threat on day two with her world class javelin throw giving her the chance to make up hundreds of points on her rivals and comes in having won the prestigious Götzis meeting in May. Auriana Lazraq-Khlass had a breakout performance at the Euros with a PR in six out of the seven events to win silver and will be spurred on by a home crowd. Noor Vidts (Belgium) comes in as the World Indoor Champion and could be in the shake up for a medal if others falter. Adrianna Sulek-Schubert was briefly the indoor pentathlon world record holder in that epic competition at European Indoors in 2023 where Thiam then broke the world record once more a few seconds later.  She gave birth in February this year and has come back to score over 6,000 points just over four months later, so she could well be a threat with another few weeks training under her belt.

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