NANJING, China: Armand ‘Mondo’ Duplantis headlines a stellar cast in the Chinese city of Nanjing for a world indoor athletics championships delayed three times by the COVID-19 pandemic.
Nanjing was picked to host the biennial event back in 2020, then in 2021 and then again in 2023.
They were all moved due to coronavirus rules. In 2022 the event was instead held in Belgrade and in 2023 in Glasgow.
It now has the green light and Nanjing’s Cube will play host to 576 athletes from 127 countries competing in 26 events over three days of action from March 21-23.
That number includes 11 individual defending champions — notably world record holders Duplantis (pole vault), Devynne Charlton and Grant Holloway (60m hurdles) — and 20 medallists from the Paris 2024 Olympic Games.
Duplantis, Holloway, Hamish Kerr (high jump), Thea Lafond (triple jump) and Miltiadis Tentoglou (long jump) followed up their Glasgow indoor successes with Olympic gold. They will be joined in Nanjing by fellow Olympic gold medallists Yaroslava Mahuchikh (high jump) and Jakob Ingebrigtsen (1500m and 3000m), also world record holders.
“I’m super excited,” Duplantis said. “It was my first time competing in China last outdoor season for the first two Diamond League meets and I jumped extremely well, broke the world record, to 6.24m.
The US-born Swede comes into the competition having bettered his world record — for the 11th time — to 6.27m at an indoor meet in the French city of Clermont on March 1.
But Duplantis insisted there would be no recalibration of his season goals.
“No, not really,” he said. “It’s not the first time I’ve broken the world record in the indoor season.
“It’s according to plan right now, as far as I want.”
Duplantis said he knew he was capable of “higher heights,” insisting that he was “not fixated” by a certain height.
“It takes a little bit of time and it’s by fairly small increments — and it does get a little bit more difficult every time.
“I’d like to get over 6.30m in the near future and then keep pushing it from there. Indoors is a great opportunity always to break the world record because we don’t have to deal with the wind and whatnot so we have a lot more controlled variables in that sense.”
Ukraine’s reigning Olympic, world and European outdoor champion Mahuchikh, will compete fresh from winning a third European title in Apeldoorn.
Mahuchikh won her latest accolade with a best of 1.99m before deciding not to go any higher, toward her record mark of 2.10m.
“I won the gold medal for my country. Of course, I am a little bit disappointed because I wanted to try and jump a bit higher,” she said.
“I hope at the next championships I will be in better shape.”
Norway’s Ingebrigtsen completed a distance double in the 1500 and 3,000m at the Apeldoorn Euros.
“Competitions and championships are what it is all about,” Ingebrigtsen said.
“I have always been training toward something and setting goals, with the championship in mind. That is what sport is about. Racing, representing our nation and celebrating the sport.”
The US team does not feature Olympic 100m champion Noah Lyles. Marcellus Moore, Emmanuel Wells and Ronnie Baker instead head the 60m entries.
Holloway will bid to become the first hurdler to win three consecutive world indoor titles. Teen prodigy Quincy Wilson is another absentee, the 17-year-old having turned down an invitation and insisting “school comes first!“
Jamaica’s Kishane Thompson, who was edged into Olympic silver by Lyles in Paris, is ruled out with an injury. Nishion Ebanks and Rohan Watson will compete in the 60m.
