Margus Hunt

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Margus Hunt (born 14 July 1987) is an Estonian athlete who specializes in the discus throw and to a lesser extent shot put. He is the current world junior record holder in discus throw.

Hunt grew up in the small town Karksi-Nuia, and took up athletics because "there wasn’t much to do". After trying decathlon he decided to concentrate on the throwing events – discus, shot and hammer throw. Hunt started training with Aleksander Tammert, an Olympic bronze medallist in discus throw from the 2004 Summer Olympics. Hunt competed in hammer throw at the 2003 World Youth Championships and discus at the 2004 World Junior Championships, placing eighth and sixth respectively.

In 2005 he won his first title at the European Junior Championships in Kaunas, throwing 62.19 metres with the 1.75 kg discus.

The next year he competed at the World Junior Championships in Beijing. He was a medal favourite in the discus competition as his personal best of 64.32 metres placed him second on the season list, topped by Mihai Grasu of Romania with 65.55 metres. The qualifying round for the discus throw final was held at 9:00 AM on the opening day, and Hunt managed to establish a new world junior record of 66.35 metres in his first throw. Grasu needed two throws to beat the qualification standard with a 58.38 m throw, increasing the Estonian hopes for a gold medal in the event. During the final which was held the following day, Hunt improved his own world junior record to 66.68 m in the fourth round and then 67.32 m in the sixth and final round. His gold medal was the first World Junior gold medal for Estonia.

Three days later he also competed in the shot put, and as a complete surprise won the gold medal. Having a personal best of 18.61 metres before the competition, he improved this to 20.53 metres in the final, beating the closest competitor Mostafa Abdul El-Moaty by 39 centimetres. Hunt became the first athlete to win the gold medal both in shot and discus at the World Junior Championships, outperforming Rutger Smith of the Netherlands who won a gold and a bronze in 2000. His winning distance of 20.53 m was even a national junior record with the 6 kg shot.

His current personal best with the senior 2 kg discus is 59.31 metres, which is 11.51 metres behind Tammert and 14.07 metres behind another Estonian Gerd Kanter.