Eliza McCartney

Eliza McCartney (born 11 December 1996) is a New Zealand track and field athlete who competes in the pole vault and won the bronze medal in this event at the 2016 Summer Olympics. She is the current New Zealand and Oceania record holder at 4.94 m (16 ft 2+1⁄4 in), and is the outdoor world junior record holder at 4.64 m (15 ft 2+1⁄2 in) (her absolute junior record has since been passed indoors). She also won the silver medal at the Summer Universiade in 2015. In 2018, she placed second at the Commonwealth Games.

McCartney was born in Auckland, where she still lives in the seaside suburb of Devonport. Her father William McCartney previously competed in the high jump while her mother Donna Marshall previously competed as a gymnast. She has two younger brothers. She attended her local primary school and then Belmont Intermediate School and later moved onto Takapuna Grammar School, where she was in the same year as the singer-songwriter Lorde; the two played netball together. McCartney was most fond of netball growing up, with her height and agility giving her an advantage in playing defence. She played several other sports in her youth, including cross country running, basketball, touch rugby, squash, tennis, swimming, and water polo. Eventually, she moved onto track and field, being a successful high jumper in her early teens before beginning pole vaulting in 2011. McCartney studied physiology at the University of Auckland.

In 2011, at age 14, McCartney began pole vaulting. Her first coach was Jeremy McColl. In 2012, McCartney won the national youth (under 18) title and the New Zealand secondary school championship. The following year she broke the New Zealand youth record and was selected for the 2013 World Youth Championships in Athletics where she finished fourth.

In July 2014 McCartney took the bronze medal at the 2014 World Junior Championships in Athletics, with a vault of 4.45 m (14 ft 7 in) which was her first New Zealand national record. In 2015, she claimed her first senior national title at the New Zealand Athletics Championships and gained the silver medal at the Universiade with a height of 4.40 m (14 ft 5 in).

On 19 December 2015 McCartney set a world junior record of 4.64 m (15 ft 2+1⁄2 in) at Auckland's Mount Smart Stadium. On 17 January 2016 she vaulted 4.65 m (15 ft 3 in) in Brisbane, Australia, improving her own national senior and junior records (but not the world junior record). McCartney and McColl's long-term goal had been for her to compete at the 2020 Summer Olympics in Tokyo, but it became clear during 2015 that the 2016 Summer Olympics in Rio de Janeiro may already be a possibility.

On 23 February 2016, she jumped 4.71 m (15 ft 5+1⁄4 in) at the Vertical Pursuit international pole vault competition at Millennium Institute of Sport in Auckland, setting four new records: New Zealand national, New Zealand under 20, New Zealand resident, and New Zealand all comers. She was subsequently added to the New Zealand team to the 2016 IAAF World Indoor Championships

On 5 March 2016, she jumped 4.80 m (15 ft 8+3⁄4 in) at the national championships in Dunedin, to surpass her own New Zealand record. It is not clear whether or not this set a new Oceania record. The IAAF normally requires a minimum of three competitors in an event for a record to be ratified and in this case, there were only two. Regardless, the Oceanian record was broken later in July 2016 by Alana Boyd of Australia, with a jump of 4.81 m.

McCartney made her senior international debut at the March 2016 IAAF World Indoor Championships in Portland, Oregon. She placed fifth with a vault of 4.70 m (15 ft 5 in), setting a new New Zealand indoor record.