WITH phenomenal reigning Olympic, world and world record-holder Armand Duplantis of Sweden in a league of his own, the rest of the field will be left battling for runner-up honors in the men’s pole vault event starting tomorrow in the 20th World Athletics Championships at the Tokyo National Stadium in the Japanese capital.
Duplantis, who owns the stratospheric world mark of 6.29 meters, seems a cinch to retain his world title for the third time in a row, and likely set a new one as well, given his generational talent.
Looming as the potential contender is Greek world No. 2 Emmanouil Karalit, who holds a personal and national best jump of 6.08 meters.
Among the rest vying to play second fiddle behind the sensational Swede is Filipino pole vaulter Ernest John Obiena, who won the silver in the 2023 edition in Budapest, Hungary, in an Asian mark of six meters flat but has slid to No. 7 in the WA ratings after a spotty season marked by injury.
He will be among the 36 qualifiers who will vie in the preliminaries tomorrow starting at 6 p.m. (5 p.m. in Manila), with the top 12 advancing to the championship round on Monday.
Obiena, whose season best is 5.80 meters, is bracketed in Group B with 17 others, together with Duplantis, two-time American world champion and Paris Olympic silver medalist Sam Kendricks, ranked No. 3 in the world, Turkey’s Ersu Sasma (No. 5) and Menno Vloon of the Netherlands.
Also swinging into action in her second straight world meet is National Open triple gold medalist Robyn Lauren Brown, who will be vying in the women’s 400-meter hurdles heats on Sept. 15, and hopes to be among those advancing to the semifinals two days later, and the finals on Sept. 17.
Both athletes are already in the Japanese capital, as shown by the pictures posted on the Philippine Athletics official Instagram account.
World Athletics is offering a total pot of $8,498,000 (around P486.611 million) to the individual and team winners, with the individual gold medalist getting $70,000 (P4 million), silver, $35,000 (P2 million), and bronze, $22,000 (P1.2 million), respectively.
