A third straight day with four gold medal events at the World Athletics Championships Budapest 23, and if Wednesday follows the precedent set on day three – with all four events coming to a dramatic conclusion to close the programme – no-one is going to be left unsatisfied.
We’ve got Jakob Ingebrigtsen in the 1500m final, Karsten Warholm trying to regain the 400m hurdles title and two very open women’s finals in the pole vault and 400m.
Plus a number of other exciting events – did someone say men’s pole vault/Mondo Duplantis – getting under way with qualifying and heats.
Is another Jake Wightman out there?
Jake Wightman caused a boilover in Oregon last year when he bolted past Jakob Ingebrigtsen as the 1500m final approached 200m to go and held him off all the way home to a shock gold medal.
The Norwegian star looks just as unbeatable this year as last, capable of running fast from the start or rolling home in the second half of the race at a pace that draws the kick out of any potential threats.
There’s plenty of runners – Yared Nuguse, Narve Gilje Nordas, Josh Kerr among them – capable of hanging on to Ingebrigtsen, but can any of them pull off the move to take the closing stages of the race away from him? On the evidence from Hayward Field, it can be done.
But you’ll get only one chance. So, take it when – or should that be if – it comes.
Warholm, Benjamin and Dos Santos
Warholm, Benjamin and Dos Santos. Sounds like a multinational law firm, but no, it’s the three dominant runners in the men’s one-lap hurdles.
Like Ingebrigtsen, Karsten Warholm wants to put Hayward Field 2022 behind him. The Norwegian got to the line – just – after a prolonged recovery from an early-season hamstring injury but was not in shape to retain his title. Instead, it passed to the second-fastest man in the world, Rai Benjamin.
Alison Dos Santos was bronze medallist at the Tokyo Olympics, running the third-fastest time ever behind Warholm’s world record 45.94 and Benjamin’s 46.72.
Has Warholm recovered the form to go back to the top? If not, will it be Benjamin or Dos Santos? Does anyone else have the credentials to challenge the three fastest ever in the event?
We’ll know at the end of day five.
Women’s vault looks open…
Not for the first time, a pole vault qualifying competition told us very little about the likely destination of the gold, silver and bronze medals. Some struggled at getting to, or over, the auto-qualifying height of 4.65m, others went clear, clear, clear, get me out of here. But almost everyone you would expect reached the final.
As ever, the ability to clear crucial heights at the first attempt will be critical. As ever, the best guide to that is who does it on a regular basis. Katie Moon has won the Olympic and World Championships in consecutive years. Sandi Morris and Nina Kennedy, medallists in Oregon, will be in the hunt again.
But anyone who clears something around 4.70m first time will be a threat.
…400m even more so
If the pole vault is hard to read, the women’s 400m final is as big a challenge as James Joyce’s Ulysses. In the semifinals, six of the finalists ran between 49.50 and 50 seconds, led by Natalia Kaczmarek, Marileidy Paulino (49.54) and Sada Williams (49.58).
If you go on winning form, Paulino was a comfortable winner of semifinal one, Lieke Klaver easily won heat two and Kaczmarek beat Williams narrowly in three. Paulino, Williams and Klaver also finished in that order behind the absent Oregon champion Shaunae Miller-Uibo.
I think that all adds up to Paulino being a slight favourite. Or that it’s anyone’s race to win.
Exciting first rounds
The men’s pole vault (Mondo Duplantis), men’s long jump and women’s javelin all have qualifying between breakfast and lunch. And on the track it’s the women’s 800m and the women’s 5000m (with Faith Kipyegon and Sifan Hassan the morning after the 1500m final).
If that’s not enough to get you going, the women’s hammer, triple jump and steeplechase have qualification and heats in the evening session as the 100m hurdles is at the semifinal stage.
It’s a bring a packed lunch and water-bag day.
Len Johnson for World Athletics