Luis Enrique Zayas has not been able to retain his title at Bansko Brystika and yet he has improved his personal best of the season.  Photo: Facebook

Havana, February 16 (ACN)-- With a mark of 2.25 meters (m), Cuban high jumper Luis Enrique Zayas came in fourth place in the World Athletics Indoor Tour silver medal at the athletics meeting in Banska Bystrika, Slovakia.

Zayas, champion of the Lima 2019 Pan American Games, shared that fourth place with Ukrainian Andriy Prosenko, both behind American Ju Vaughn Harrison (2.28 m), who closed the group of the top three podium finishers.

Sanghyeok Woo (2.35 m), from South Korea, won this competition just one centimeter away from the record with which he leads the world list of this event in the current winter season; while the Russian Ilya Ivanyuk (2.31 m) placed second, according to the official website of World Athletics.

In the case of the Cuban athlete, he had finished third in his two previous outings, so this time he could not place among the medalists.

On February 5, he achieved his best indoor mark of the year with 2.30 m in the Hustopeche lid, in the Czech Republic.

With that result he improved by 10 centimeters what he did in his first performance of the winter tour in Udine, Italy, on February 2.

In Czech territory, with the record achieved, he was quite close to the minimum required height (2.34 m) to qualify for the World Indoor Championships to be held in Belgrade, Serbia, from March 18 to 20.

The event in Hustopeche, with bronze category of the World Athletics Indoor Tour, was won by Woo, with a personal best of 2.36m.

In that meeting Zayas started jumping without difficulties 2.16 m and also surpassed without fail the heights of 2.20, 2.24, 2.28 and 2.30 m, to then give up the 2.32 m and try unsuccessfully three times to overcome the 2.34 m.

Previously in Udine, the Santiago native had a record of 2.20 m, lower than the 2.24 m he reached in that event last year.