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how far did greg rutherford jump

Greg Rutherford’s longest legal competitive long jump is 8.51 metres, set in Chula Vista, California, in April 2014, and it stands as the British record.

Quick Scoop: How far did Greg Rutherford jump?

Greg Rutherford is a retired British long jumper best known for winning Olympic gold at London 2012 and for pushing the British long jump record into world‑class territory. Over his career he consistently jumped over 8 metres, but one performance stands above the rest.

His biggest leap

  • Personal best (PB): 8.51 m.
  • Location: Chula Vista, California, USA.
  • Date: 25 April 2014.
  • Status: British long jump record.

There was some debate at the time from rival jumper Chris Tomlinson, who argued that the 8.51 m jump should have been ruled a foul, but UK Athletics reviewed video evidence and upheld the mark as legal.

Big championship jumps

When people ask “how far did Greg Rutherford jump?” they often mean “how far did he jump to win his biggest titles?”

Here are the key ones:

[7] [9][1][3] [10][1]
Event Year Winning distance
Olympic Games (London) 2012 8.31 m
World Championships (Beijing) 2015 8.41 m
European Championships (Zurich) 2014 Reported around 8.2–8.3 m range (gold medal performance).
These distances show how he combined consistency with peak jumps over 8.4 m at major championships.

Why 8.51 m matters

  • It put him among the best long jumpers globally in the 2010s, even if still short of Mike Powell’s world record of 8.95 m.
  • It capped a period where Rutherford managed to hold the Olympic, World, European and Commonwealth titles at the same time, a rare feat for a British athlete.

In practical terms, if you’re just looking for the headline number to remember when you search “how far did Greg Rutherford jump”, the answer is his 8.51 m British record.

Information gathered from public forums or data available on the internet and portrayed here.