Havana, August 28 (ACN) -- Cuba finished in a meritorious 17th place in the points table and 25th in the medal standings at the 19th World Athletics Championships, successfully concluded on Sunday in Budapest, Hungary.

The Cuban delegation scored 27 points and won three medals (0-1-2), among more than 200 countries, to meet its main objective, to improve last year's performance in Eugene, when it went without medals for the first time in the history of the world championships, founded in 1983.

A year ago, the island placed 29th by country with 15 units and no metals of any color, with two fourth places, one sixth and one seventh.
It should be taken into account that the first eight places in each of the events are contributed to the overall score.

This Sunday, at the closing of the competitive activity, there was no Cuban presence, in a race in which the triple jumpers, in both sexes, were the best performers.

First it was the turn of the men, through Lázaro Martínez and Cristian Nápoles, who won silver and bronze, respectively, in the final of the triple jump.

Martinez, indoor world champion in Belgrade, Serbia, last year, reached 17.41 meters (m), while Napoles (17.40 m) followed him with a personal best, just one centimeter (cm) behind his teammate.

Then came the good performance of Leyanis Perez, who won the bronze medal with a very good record of 14.96 m, just two centimeters away from his lifetime best.

Perez, who finished fourth in last year's world championship, this time was able to climb the podium and confirm herself as one of the elite triathletes in the world.

The performance of her compatriot Liadagmis Povea (14.87 m), who finished in sixth place, also deserves special mention, according to the official World Athletics website.

Povea, fifth at the Tokyo 2020 Olympic Games, with her performance once again proved that she is among the best in the triple jump.

In other outstanding performances, high jumper Luis Enrique Zayas came close to the bronze medal, finishing in a superlative fourth place.

With an outdoor personal best of 2.33 m, Zayas finished with the same record as Qatar's Mutasz Essa Barshim, who won the bronze because he made fewer mistakes in the competition.

Champion of the Lima 2019 Pan American Games, the Santiago native, who placed fifth and sixth in the editions of Doha 2019 and Eugene 2022, respectively, now improved those performances and continues to demonstrate that he is in the vanguard group of the high jump.

Also for the largest of the Antilles, young Silinda Morales, eleventh in the discus throw, and Alejandro Parada, tenth in the long jump, were included among the 12 finalists.

As expected, the United States dominated the medal tally with a great haul of 12 titles, eight silver medals and nine bronze medals, followed by Canada (4-2-0) and Spain (4-1-0), which closed the leading trio.