Daniel Golubovic (athletics) put together a colossal effort in a thrilling final 1500m event of the men’s decathlon at the Birmingham 2022 Commonwealth Games. Needing to win by 23 seconds to beat defending champion Lindon Victor, he crossed the finish line first but fell short by just three seconds to finish the 10-event competition with a score of 8197 points and claim the silver medal. It came just 12 days after the US-born athlete made his senior Australian debut at the world championships in Eugene.

Born and raised in Los Angeles, Golubovic comes from a strong sporting pedigree. His mother is a former UCLA volleyball player, his maternal grandfather played college football at Stanford University, while his paternal grandfather represented Yugoslavia in soccer. Daniel’s father was born in Australia, so he sat out of international competition for three years before being approved to represent Australia in 2020 shortly before COVID struck. Although he won the decathlon at both the 2021 Oceania Combined Events Championships in Brisbane (8336 points) and Festival of Athletics (8223), he fell short of qualifying for the Tokyo Olympics.

He finished 12th at the Budapest 2023 world champs and had a nervous wait until the end of the qualification period to make his Olympic debut in Paris in 2024 where he was 19th.

Golubovic has degrees in management and economics from Duke University and the University of California San Diego and works working as a pricing analyst at Shell in Brisbane.