Henry Lindblad

As a true all-round track and field athlete Henry Lindblad specialised in the pole vault and won seven Swedish titles in the discipline. In addition to being the first Swede to vault four metres Lindblad also won three AAA titles in England and competed at the Olympics. He won his first national title in the pole vault in 1925 when he cleared 3.65 metres. Two years later he won his first AAA championship in England with a best clearance of 3.81 metres.

In July 1928 Lindblad vaulted 3.92 metres to set his first Swedish record in the event. A month later he competed in both the pole vault and the decathlon at the 1928 Amsterdam Olympics. He finished in seventh place in the pole vault after clearing 3.90 metres. In the decathlon he did not win his favourite event, finishing joint-second with two other athletes who all cleared 3.60 metres. He did, however, finish in first place in the long jump with 6.97 metres, seven centimetres ahead of Tatsuo Toki. After the completion of all ten disciplines Lindblad finished in ninth place in Amsterdam. Shortly after the Olympics he became the first Swedish athlete to clear four metres before going on to win his second national title in the event.

Lindblad won five more Swedish titles in the pole vault (1930–31, 1933, 1936–37), two silvers (1934–35), and two more AAA titles (1930–31). At the Swedish national championships he won two silvers in the pole vault (1934–35), along with silver in the long jump (1928), and bronze in the decathlon (1925) and the pentathlon (1929). In 1934 at the inaugural edition of the European Athletics Championships Lindblad shared seventh place in the pole vault.

Outside of sport Lindblad worked as a business assistant in Stockholm. Tragically his life was cut short after he died from injuries he suffered in an assault in Stockholm in 1946. He was 40-years-old.

Personal Bests: PV – 4.13 (1931); Dec – 5906 (1928).