The Philippines Ej Obiena is now the world’s No.2 in the men’s pole vault rankings. Obiena was previously No.3 but surpassed Chris Nilsen of the United States when he amassed 1,432 ranking points, four points ahead of the American. Sweden’s Mondo Duplantis remained on top of the pole vault ladder with 1.569 points. The skinny boy from Tondo has been making waves, recently ruling the Asian Athletics meet with a new record of 5.91 meters eclipsing his previous 5.71m in 2019. Obiena 27, already qualified for the 2014 Paris Olympics. His second stint in the Games, when he cleared 5.82m in the Bauhaus-Galan leg of the Diamond Leauge in Stockholm, Sweden. Obiena also joined the exclusive “six-meter club” when he became the first Pinoy and Asian to clear six meters to win the Bergen Jump Challenge in Norway. Obiena also won the gold in this year’s 32nd Sea Games in Cambodia, establishing a new meet record with 5.65m for his third straight domination of the event. Before he sets his sight for a medal in Paris, he plans to do well in the Asian Games slated in September. His coach Vitaly Petrov will be on the sideline when he competes in th Monaco leg of the Diamond League. Obiena has also qualified to the Worlds Athletics Championships in Hungary in August. Petrov said they will just do off-season training after the Asian Games, to make sure Obiena is injury-free when the indoor season in February next year, comes up.