’09 Women’s Performance Of The Year: Isi’s Vault WR
Isi’s Payback WR
Last year Yelena Isinbayeva’s WR vault missed out as POY by a single point. It was tight again this year, but in her WC-redemption performance in Zürich she won enough hearts and minds to eke out a 3-point win over hammer recordsetter Anita Wùodarzcyk.
The ’04 and ’05 winner as well, Isi is only the second with a trio of POY wins. East Germany’s Marita Koch picked off 4 with various 400 performances during her storied career in the ’70s and ’80s.
The 18 performances which received votes (No. 1s in parentheses):
- Yelena Isinbayeva’s 16-7¼/5.06 WR, 67 (8)
- Anita Wùodarczyk’s 255-9/77.96 WR, 64 (5)
- Carmelita Jeter’s 10.64, 43 (2)
- Blanka Vlaðiã’s 6-9¾/2.08, 37 (1)
- Melaine Walker’s 52.42 WC win, 30 (1)
- Jeter’s 10.67 (-0.1 wind), 19 (3)
- tie, Steffi Nerius’s 220‑9/67.30 WC win & Dani Samuels’ 214-8/65.44 WC win, 7
- tie, Valerie Vili’s 69-1½/21.07, Shelly-Ann Fraser’s 10.73 WC win & Sanya Richards’ 49.00 WC win, 4
- Brigitte Foster-Hylton’s 12.51 WC win, 3
- tie, Vlaðiã’s 6-8¼/2.04 WC win, Meselech Melkamu’s 29:53.80, Jessica Ennis’s 6731 WC win, Brittney Reese’s 23-3½/7.10 WC win & Amy Yoder Begley’s 6th-place WC finish, 2
- Chelsea Johnson’s 15-3/4.65 WC silver, 1.