Latvia
2024
Five years after a World Championships with no finalists, one Latvian stood in an Olympic final — and the bar he has cleared since is higher than any of the ones he jumped there.
Latvia took eight athletes to the Paris 2024 Olympic athletics programme and won no medals in any sport, but Valters Kreišs cleared 5.70 to reach the pole vault final and finished 12th — only the second Latvian vaulter in history to make an Olympic final.
This is the season on the vault standards: the qualifying bar, the final, the season best and the national record that came a year later — plus the Latvia international team kit of 2024, one piece of which is in this archive.
Part of our Season Series — one year at a time. The full national story is in The History of Athletics in Latvia. Jump to the 2024 kit or browse the collection.
- The Games
- Paris, athletics 1–11 Aug 2024
- The team
- 8 athletes (3 men, 5 women) — no Latvian medals in any sport
- The finalist
- Kreišs: 5.70 in qualifying, 5.50 in the final, 12th
- Why it matters
- Only the second Latvian pole vaulter ever in an Olympic final
- The javelin again
- 4 of the 8 were javelin throwers — none through
- Gailums
- Personal best 84.05 (2023) — threw 77.26 in Paris
- After Paris
- Kreišs cleared 5.82 in Roubaix, 2025 — the Latvian national record
- Kit
- No federation deal on record — the archive's pieces are read from their own labels
The Box That Finally Filled
Latvia sent eight athletes to the Paris 2024 Olympic athletics programme — three men, five women — and left the Games without a medal in any sport. But the funnel of 2019 finally reached its third gate: Valters Kreišs cleared 5.70 in pole vault qualifying and made the final, where he vaulted 5.50 for twelfth. It was only the second time in history that a Latvian pole vaulter had reached an Olympic final.
Bar heights are to scale between 5.40 and 5.90; the dashed bar is the final itself. Hover or tab on a standard. Sources: Wikipedia, Latvia at the 2024 Summer Olympics and Valters Kreišs; LSM. Verified August 2026.
The Kreišs heights (table)
| Where | Height |
|---|---|
| Paris 2024, qualifying | 5.70 — through to the final |
| Paris 2024, final | 5.50 — 12th; second Latvian vaulter ever in an Olympic final |
| Latvian championships 2024 | 5.72 — his season best |
| Roubaix 2025 | 5.82 — Latvian national record |
The rest of the team stopped earlier. Gunta Vaičule — a survivor of the Doha twelve — ran 51.13 and then 50.93 in the 400 m repechage without advancing; Agate Caune was 33rd in her 5000 m heat; Rūta Kate Lasmane jumped 13.76 in the triple and did not progress. And the javelin, again, took half the team: Čakšs, Gailums, Mūze and Sietiņa, four of the eight, none through. Patriks Gailums arrived with an 84.05 personal best from 2023 and threw 77.26.
The Step, Not the Ceiling
What makes the Paris final worth a page of its own is what came after it. Kreišs's best of 2024 was 5.72 at the Latvian championships; in 2025, in Roubaix, he cleared 5.82 — the Latvian national record. The Olympic final, in other words, was the step, not the top.
Agate Caune, born in 2004, already held the national 3000 m and 5000 m records from 2023 (8:39.78 and 15:00.48) before Paris; her 2025 was a quieter apprenticeship on European under-23 ground. Two names from the Doha twelve — Vaičule and Čakšs — were on this team too: the continuity of a country whose entire senior squad would fit in a minibus.
From this season · in the archiveNike Latvia International Team 2024 Pro Elite T-ShirtLatvia international team tee from the 2024 programme — the year one Latvian finally stood in an Olympic final.120,00 €View piece →The Kit — Read From the Garments
As with 2019, we do not name the brand that dressed Latvia in Paris: no supplier deal for the federation is documented for 2024 either. The archive's Latvia international team pieces come from the federation's own programmes, and everything we say about them comes from their labels.
Attribution policy: no documented federation deal means no brand claim. The garment's own marks are the only source we print.
The season before this one — twelve athletes and an empty final box — is Latvia 2019. The full arc is in our history of athletics in Latvia.
Latvia 2024
Latvia international team pieces from the federation's 2024 programme — the year the country finally put someone in an Olympic final.
Did Latvia win a medal at Paris 2024?
No — Latvia left the Games without a medal in any sport. Its best athletics result was Valters Kreišs's twelfth place in the pole vault final.
Why was Kreišs reaching the final significant?
It was only the second time in history that a Latvian pole vaulter reached an Olympic final. He cleared 5.70 in qualifying and 5.50 in the final — and a year later set the Latvian record at 5.82 in Roubaix.
How many javelin throwers did Latvia take to Paris?
Four of the eight athletes — Čakšs, Gailums, Mūze and Sietiņa — and none reached a final. In Doha 2019 it had been five of twelve.
What kit did Latvia wear in Paris 2024?
No supplier deal for the federation is documented for 2024, so we make no brand claim. The Latvia collection holds international team pieces described from their own labels.
Sources and References
- Wikipedia — Latvia at the 2024 Summer Olympics — the eight-athlete team and every Paris result quoted
- LSM — Kreišs makes the Olympic final — the 5.70 and the second-ever Latvian vaulter in an Olympic final
- Wikipedia — Valters Kreišs — the 5.72 of 2024 and the 5.82 national record of 2025
- Wikipedia — Agate Caune — the national 3000 m and 5000 m records of 2023