Jovan van Vuuren: How South African long jump ace defied career-ending injury to chase Paris 2024 dream
Hamstrung by injuries, South African long jumper Jovan van Vuuren was on the brink of being forced into early retirement, cutting short a promising career and the dream of reaching the Olympic Games.
Each time Van Vuuren would be knocked down by injury, he would stubbornly come back stronger defying the hand he was dealt.
A year after receiving the devastating news from a doctor that his career was effectively over, Van Vuuren made a stunning comeback with a personal best leap of 8.30m that would earn him automatic qualification for Paris 2024.
Van Vuuren entered the 2023 season bolstered by a breakthrough campaign the year before which saw him being crowned national champion for the first time and leaping to Commonwealth Games bronze in Birmingham.
But the years of jumping had taken its toll on Van Vuuren’s body, with his take-off leg bearing the brunt of the persistent force. During a training jump, Van Vuuren felt a shooting pain in his leg and knew something serious had gone wrong.
A scan confirmed his worst nightmare. Van Vuuren’s hamstring tendon was hanging by a thread. “The doctor said, ‘It is finished. You will never be able to do sport again,” Van Vuuren recalled.
Defying the odds
Initially numbed by the prognosis, Van Vuuren soon regained his default setting of eternal optimist. He spoke to former long jump world bronze medallist Ruswahl Samaai and former training partner, Olympic 400m champion Wayde van Niekerk, for advice on navigating the road to recovery. As part of his support team, they suggested that Van Vuuren consult a sports psychologist to help him along the way.
With the help of a team of experts led by conditioning coach and miracle worker, Niel du Plessis, Van Vuuren started a rigorous nine-hour-a-day rehabilitation regime.
On his first follow-up scan eight weeks later, Van Vuuren stunned the doctor into silence. His ruptured tendon had healed.
“He scanned my leg and went quiet. He then asked me to contract my muscles…he then took off his glasses and asked, ‘What did you do? This thing has grown back. How did you do this?’
“And I said: ‘Faith, hope and a good team behind me.”
By October 2023, the South African athlete was given the all-clear to resume jump training under the tutelage of coach Neil Cornelius, the mentor to Rio 2016 silver medallist and former world champion Luvo Manyonga.
'I am best friends with injuries'
Van Vuuren returned to the sandpit by opening his season with a creditable 7.99m leap, which suggested he had fully recovered from his injury. Less than two months later, he made a remarkable comeback with the best jump of his career at the provincial championships. The 27-year-old landed a personal best of 8.24m on his third attempt. On his fourth, he extended the tape measure to 8.30m. His effort launched him into fifth place on South Africa’s all-time list.
Van Vuuren, who started as a 400m runner under the guidance of Van Niekerk’s former coach Ans Botha, suddenly emerged as a potential Olympic medal prospect. The distance ranks him among the top 10 jumpers in 2024 and would have been good enough for at least a bronze medal at the last four Olympic Games.
“You go through a dark time during that time where you lose yourself and you find yourself again facing your demons,” he told Olympics.com.
“You rediscover yourself in a way where you identify your flaws. You can say that I am best friends with injuries. Injuries can also serve as motivation. Competing has a different meaning on your comeback. It is almost personal, and you are driven to prove people wrong.”
Jovan van Vuuren during the Birmingham 2022 Commonwealth Games
Jovan van Vuuren: Overcoming setbacks
In the build-up to his big leap, Van Vuuren injured his abductors which he exacerbated in his effort to qualify for the Olympic Games. Van Vuuren has since sat out of the South African Track and Field Championships in April and missed the first month of his European season. He is expected to make his return in June after completing his rehabilitation programme.
If Van Vuuren’s historical comebacks are anything to go by, he could be set to unleash some of the best leaps of his career.
Shortly before Tokyo 2020 (in 2021), Van Vuuren fractured his pelvis, which ended any chances of him qualifying for the showpiece via ranking points. Van Vuuren was short of the qualifying distance and had hoped to reach the Games on points.
On his return in 2022, he opened his season by landing a then-personal best of 8.16m, which ultimately set the stage for his breakthrough year.
Van Vuuren went on to compete at his first World Championships, where he missed out on the final before winning bronze at the Birmingham Commonwealth Games with a jump of 8.06m.
The beauty and the trauma of the Olympic dream
Asked about what sparked his Olympic ambitions, Van Vuuren points to fellow horizontal jumper and South African legend Khotso Mokoena’s achievement at the global showpiece. Mokoena, a former World Championship runner-up, was South Africa’s only medallist at the Olympic Games Beijing 2008, winning silver with a best effort of 8.24m.
“Now and then I would give Khotso a call for advice on where he thinks I should improve. The fact that he was the only man to win a medal for South Africa was inspirational,” Van Vuuren said.
“He inspired so many people. He inspired me, his performance planted the seed in me. The fact that he is still involved in athletics shows that he continues to impact the sport the way that he did when he was competing.”
Van Vuuren hopes that when he finally makes his Olympic debut in Paris, his comeback story will inspire others and give hope to those whose dreams appear to be in tatters.
“It is a beautiful thing to reach for the Olympics but there is a lot of trauma that goes with it – physical and psychological – because not every person has the perseverance to continue believing despite the odds being stacked against you,” Van Vuuren said.
“I hope it touches people and gives hope to those who are in a similar position. People tend to accept the reality when they are told that it is over. But I believe that you should give me a fair chance, even if it is 10 percent. I will make 100 percent of that chance.”
- As National Olympic Committees have the exclusive authority for the representation of their respective countries at the Olympic Games, athletes' participation at the Paris Games depends on their NOC selecting them to represent their delegation at Paris 2024.
- Click here to see the official qualification system for each sport.