Ladji Doucouré

About Ladji Doucouré

With a Malian father and a Senegalese mother, Ladji Doucouré is a child from the southern suburbs of Paris. He was passionate about football from an early age and began athletics to improve his physical condition for football. However, a fractured tibia from a strong tackle tipped the balance towards athletics.

A very versatile athlete licensed at Viry Evry Nord Sud Essonne, he tried his hand at the decathlon, then specialized in the 110m hurdles. He trains at INSEP with the training group of Renaud Longuèvre. Ladji has been considered since his early years as the prodigy of French athletics.

In 2004, during his first Olympic Games in Athens, he gradually became one of the favorites for the final, breaking the French record twice. In the final, Ladji fell at the last hurdle while trying to catch up with the Chinese Liu Xiang, even though the podium was within his reach. His sportsmanship and reaction after the race left a mark on the French public.

He became world champion in hurdles on August 12, 2005, at the World Athletics Championships in Helsinki. He left behind the Chinese Olympic champion Liu Xiang and four Americans. The next day, on August 13, 2005, he became world champion in the 4x100m with his teammates from the French Team.

Hampered by a calf injury, Ladji could not defend his chances at the European Championships in 2006. He withdrew in the semi-final and decided to end his season. After a few weeks of recovery, he returned to training with one goal in mind: the 2007 World Championships in Japan.

Unfortunately, Ladji could not make up for lost time and had to wait ten months to return to competition. Lacking benchmarks, Ladji flew to Japan without any reference time. He narrowly missed the final by one hundredth of a second.