Record-breaking Armand Duplantis has predicted a “super-sick” world championships in Tokyo, where he won his first Olympic medal in the Covid-delayed Games, but insisted statistics were unimportant to him.
The Swede has been in electric form, setting a 13th world record, of 6.29 metres, in Budapest on Aug 12 to further seal his claim as one of the best track-and-field athletes in history.
But he shies away from the bravado often shown by sprinters, reiterating that he is not bothered by the numbers game.
“I’m just making sure that all the little details and everything are very polished and that I’m really ready to go at the most important time,” Duplantis said ahead of this week’s Diamond League meet in Silesia, Poland.
“It’s a lot of recognition,” he conceded of setting multiple world records.
“It’s always an amazing feeling and I’m always super grateful, and it feels kind of surreal in a way every time I’ve been able to push the record a little bit higher.”
A return to Tokyo’s Olympic Stadium for the Sept 13-21 World Champs, with a full crowd compared to the empty tribunes in 2021 because of the pandemic, left Duplantis “super excited”.
