Olympic gold medal winner Nina Kennedy set for gold medal cash-in on and off the track
Pole Vault superstar Nina Kennedy’s Olympic gold medal triumph is being followed by paydays on and off the track.
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OLYMPIC golden girl Nina Kennedy continues to cash in on the greatest season of her career.
The pole vault superstar was the highest-earning Australian medallist at the Paris Olympics thanks to a $74,000 bonus from World Athletics for gold medallists at the Games.
It was estimated by digital leader MoneyMe that overall Kennedy earned $104,400 for her heroics in Paris.
And the cash keeps coming with the Western Australian pocketing another $15,000 for claiming victory on Thursday at the Zurich Diamond League, her fourth win on the tour this season.
She will start the red-hot favourite for the season-ending Diamond League final in Brussels next week where the winner’s cheque is $45,000.
With sponsorship bonuses - she is one of Puma’s world-wide star athletes - Kennedy could potentially end up reaping close to $500,000 in 2024.
And there could be more to come given the reaction Kennedy received when she returned briefly to Australia following the Games.
The 27-year-old was in high demand with her good looks and spunky personality ticking a lot of boxes for corporate Australia as they search for strong female role models to be associated with their brands.
The way Kennedy dominated the Olympic final and has clearly been on another level to her opponents all season, this could be the start of a golden era for the former gymnast who has incredibly been competing with a broken back in recent months.
A stress fracture in her back flared in May but she changed her training methods to manage the issue, adding another chapter to her stunning success story.
Kennedy has now won the Zurich event, which is spectacularly held in the main hall of the Swiss city’s train station, on a raised runway, with fans and passers-by packed in close to the action, three times.
A first-time clearance at 4.87m guaranteed the win for the Australian with her fellow Olympic medallists Alysha Newman and Katie Moon both bowing out at 4.82m.
After winning the Olympic title in Paris Kennedy spoke about her desire to chase the women’s pole vault world record of 5.06m which was set back in 2009 by Russia’s Yelena Isinbayeva.
But first she set her sights on the six-year-old Oceania record of 4.94m, held by New Zealander Eliza McCartney, and raised the bar to 4.95m in Zurich but was unsuccessful.
“I love Zurich so much,” Kennedy said. “This is an amazing place to jump. I wanted to come here and jump 4.95 but unfortunately I didn’t. I don’t know about being unbeatable. These girls are pushing me. I had to work hard today.”
Kennedy, who set the Australian record of 4.91m last year, has had an incredible 12 months after tieing for the world title in Budapest last year with Moon.
On her world record chase, she said: “I’m still quite young in the scheme of things so maybe in the next few years, that world record will be on the cards.”
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