The men"s competition also offers a very strong and unusually balanced line-up. Four competitors from the top ten in the world rankings, three finalists of the last Olympics and thirteen athletes with personal bests of over 230 cm suggest a great spectacle. It"s hard to find favourites in this line-up. These should include, in particular, the Korean athlete Sanghyeok Woo with a PB of 235 cm. This performance has won him 4th place at the Olympic Games in Tokyo, Japan last year. The former Youth World Champion has secured a number of valuable medals, including gold from the Asian Championship and silver from the Asian Games. His big competition will be the ninth at the Olympics and the world number four Russian Ilya Ivanyuk. The bronze medalist from both the World Championship and the European Championship is one of the world"s most experienced high jumper, and his personal maximum is a respectable number of 237 cm. Comparing the Korean athlete, he will also have the advantage of knowing the Hustopeče environment. He has raced here twice in the past. The world number seven Ukrainian Andriy Protsenko has appeared in Hustopeče even once more. He is the only one on the starting with a personal best of 240 cm. In Hustopeče, he managed to overcome at least 230 cm every time. The fourth from the Olympic Games in Rio and the eighth from the Olympic Games in London also have silver from Indoor and Outdoor European Championships and Indoor World Championship. Probably the best jumper in the world who combines high jump and long jump is undoubtedly JuVaughn Harrison from the USA. At the last Olympic Games, he managed to make it to the finals both in the long jump (5th place) and in the high jump (7th place). His personal maximum in HJ is 236 cm from last year (LJ PB 845 cm). The indoor specialist is the best Cuban high jumper Luis Enrique Zayas. His indoor personal maximum is 233 cm from the year before last. This 24-year-old finished 5th at the last World Championship in Doha and won the American Games the same year. He will show up in Hustopeče for the second time.

For the first time a Syrian representative will jump in Hustopeče. His name is Majd Eddin Ghazal and he is a bronze medalist from the WC and his PB is 236 cm. His first performance this year in Kladno suggests that he would like to attack the world extra class this year. And why not in Hustopeče? The Japanese national high jumper Naoto Tobe also has a high-quality personal maximum of 235 cm. This experienced athlete knows the atmosphere of big races and, among other things, owns bronze medals from the Asian Games and the Asian Championship. The fourth man from the 2017 World Championship in London, the Mexican Edgar Rivera, who evened his personal best of 231 cm last year, is a stable participant in races in Hustopeče. He is going to complete his first race of the season in Hustopeče. And he also knows what it is like to overcome 230 cm in Hustopeče. The Swede Fabian Delryd, who has a personal maximum of a respectable 233 cm, will start in Hustopeče for the second time. Another of the well-known Bulgarian high jumpers Tihomír Ivanov (PB 231 cm) knows the atmosphere of the Olympic finals. The tenth man in the Rio Olympics also has two gold medals in the Balkan Games or two fourth places in the European Indoor Championships.

This year, other participants of Hustopečské Skákání have made their first starts in the Czech Republic already. Nauraj Singh Randhawa from Malaysia (PB 230 cm) finished second in Kladno with a performance of 225 cm and Lithuanian athlete Andrijus Glebauskas (PB 230 cm) with the same performance ended up fourth. The well-known Brazilian Fernando Ferreira has the same personal best as the previous two. Hustopečské Skákání will also offer a duel of two of our best present Czech men high jumpers. The current European Champion (under 22 years) Jan Štefela set a personal best of 221 cm at the first start of the season. Marek Bahník then jumped a centimetre more in Kladno. But his personal record is significantly better. The year before, he jumped over the bar at a height of 225 cm in Ostrava.