Australia's Kennedy soars to women's pole vault title

PARIS :Australia's Nina Kennedy soared to the gold medal in the Olympic women's pole vault on Wednesday, a year after she shared gold at the world championships with American Katie Moon.

The 27-year-old Kennedy cleared a season's best 4.90 metres in a victory that was also redemption for the Tokyo Olympics in which injuries caused her to be eliminated in the preliminary round.

Moon, who won gold in Tokyo, cleared 4.85m for silver while Canada's Alysha Newman went over the same height but was awarded bronze due to more missed jumps.

Kennedy and Moon decided to share gold at year's world championships in Budapest after they both vaulted 4.90m.