Tokyo (AFP)

Great favorite of the decathlon but diminished by back pain, Kevin Mayer was able to re-mobilize to snatch the silver medal at the Tokyo Olympics on Thursday, finally opening the counter of the French athletics team, in great difficulty .

French athletics is however heading towards a starving and extremely worrying record before Paris-2024.

The world record holder (9126 points) will therefore not have managed to do better than the second place won in Rio in 2016. A huge disappointment for the one who aspired to bring back from Japan the only title that is still missing from his rich record. .

But an embarrassment that arose a week before the start of his ten labors ruined all his plans.

Mayer, who has hardly ever been in his usual standards during his two days of hard work, except for height (2.08 m), pole vault (5.20 m) and javelin (73.09 m) , personal record), helplessly witnessed the victory of his great rival Damian Warner, the first man to exceed the symbolic bar of 9000 points at the Olympic Games (9018).

The 2017 world champion, in great difficulty halfway (5th), nevertheless managed to get back on track so as not to leave empty-handed, ultimately failing 292 lengths behind the Canadian (8726 points).

Canadian Damian Warner (g) gold medal and French Kevin Mayer (d) silver medal in the decathlon at the Tokyo Olympics, August 5, 2021 Jonathan NACKSTRAND AFP

This failure is all the more cruel for the Frenchman as he had to fight with a diminished physique, despite the use of anti-inflammatory drugs to relieve his pain.

But the thesis of the accident is complicated to invoke for the headliner of the Blues who has just signed his third disappointment in a row in a major competition, after his two withdrawals at Euro-2018, after a zero at the length, and at the Worlds-2019, on injury.

Mayer has certainly broken the world record in the meantime, in September 2018 at Talence, but he only gleaned one success in the space of four years in a championship, last winter in the heptathlon at the Euro in the dining room.

A very poor result for the leader of French athletics.

- Discomfiture of the Blues -

The new misadventure of Mayer is the perfect symbol of the triumph of the Habs in Tokyo.

Their meter may indeed be stuck at a single small medal, unless pre-retired Yohann Diniz (43 years old) performs on the unpredictable 50 km walk, which will be contested in Sapporo on Friday in sweltering heat.

A possible fiasco that calls out to three years of the Paris Olympics in 2024 and would come two years after the Worlds totally failed (2 podiums, no title).

The French Aurel Manga (g) and France's Pascal Martinot-Lagarde after the 110m hurdles final of the Tokyo Olympics, August 5, 2021 Javier SORIANO AFP

The Blues could have hoped to save their honor somewhat on Thursday with, in addition to Mayer, two representatives in the 110m hurdles final.

But neither Pascal Martinot-Lagarde (5th in 13 sec 16) nor Aurel Manga (8th and last in 13 sec 38) managed to challenge the victory of Jamaican Hansle Parchment (13 sec 04), which caused a very big surprise in having the skin of the second world performer of all time, the American Grant Holloway (2nd in 13 sec 09).

Martinot-Lagarde, European champion in 2018 and third at the Doha Worlds in 2019, could not in any case work miracles after seeing his season disrupted by physical problems (right hamstring, left adductor, tendonitis) .

“I didn't have much hope. I had made a chaotic preparation. I only really trained for the last two weeks. It used to be DIY. I dropped everything I had, but it didn't 'was not enough. I am very disappointed, but I have no regrets, "said" PML "who said he was" hungry "for Paris-2024.

Apart from the Blues, the Bahamian Steven Gardiner, world gold medalist (2019) and undefeated since 2017, enforced the logic on 400 m (43 sec 85).

French Pascal Martinot-Lagarde (d) and American Daniel Roberts in the 110m hurdles final of the Tokyo Olympics, August 5, 2021 Ina FASSBENDER AFP

In women's pole vault, it was the American Katie Nageotte who was crowned Olympic champion (4.90 m), signing the first great success of her career, while the Belgian Nafissatou Thiam won a second Olympic title at the heptathlon (6791 points).

© 2021 AFP