Track and field season rolls on post-Olympics

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If you’re new-ish to the newsletter, Monday’s editions typically feature a catch-up on the most interesting results from the weekend in Olympic sports. But, since many of those sports are enjoying some post-Paris downtime right now, there’s a dearth of stuff to recap.

Luckily, track and field has not slowed down. Sure, some Olympic stars are taking it a bit easier these days as they come off their Paris peaks. But many are still going full speed with just a few weeks left to earn money and rack up points to qualify for the prestigious Diamond League Final.

At Sunday’s Diamond League meet in Poland, Swedish pole-vault sensation Armand “Mondo” Duplantis cleared 6.26 metres to break (by one centimetre) the world record he set with his spectacular gold-medal performance in Paris. Olympic men’s 5,000m champion Jakob Ingebrigtsen of Norway smashed the 28-year-old world record in the 3,000m, just three days after reclaiming his 1,500m supremacy by defeating Olympic Cinderella Cole Hocker of the U.S. at a different Diamond League stop in Switzerland. And Olympic men’s 200m champ Letsile Tebogo of Botswana also picked up his second Diamond League win of the week.

Meanwhile, Canadian 800m star Marco Arop earned a satisfying victory over rival Emmanuel Wanyonyi, the Kenyan who clipped Arop by one hundredth of a second for the Olympic gold in Paris before winning their rematch on Thursday in Lausanne. Here’s more on Sunday’s meet in Poland.

WATCH | Arop tops Wanyonyi in rematch:

Only two stops remain on the Diamond League circuit before the Sept. 13-14 Final in Brussels. That meet is reserved for the top-ranked athletes in each event, based on a season-long points system.

The next meet, on Friday in Rome, is expected to include Canadian stars Alysha Newman and Moh Ahmed. Newman won a surprising women’s pole vault bronze in Paris, while Ahmed finished fourth in a thrilling men’s 10,000m final before crashing out of the 5,000 in qualifying. 

Newman will be up against Olympic champ Nina Kennedy of Australia. Ahmed won’t have to face Ingebrigtsen, but the men’s 5,000m field does include Ronald Kwemoi of Kenya and American Grant Fisher, who rounded out the podium in Paris.

Other international standouts on the entry list for Rome include American shot putter Ryan Crouser, who captured an unprecedented third consecutive Olympic title in Paris, and Kenyan runner Faith Kipyegon, who three-peated in the women’s 1,500. Paris champions Quincy Hall of the United States (men’s 400m), Masai Russell of the U.S. (women’s 100m hurdles), Hamish Kerr of New Zealand (men’s high jump) and Winfred Yavi of Bahrain (women’s steeplechase) are also slated to compete.

Olympic men’s 100m champion Noah Lyles is out, but the stacked start list does include Paris silver medallist Kishane Thompson of Jamaica, bronze medallist Fred Kerley of the U.S., and 2021 Olympic champ Marcel Jacobs of Italy.

You can watch the Rome Diamond League meet live Friday from 3-5 p.m. ET on CBCSports.ca, the CBC Sports app and CBC Gem.