In a post-Olympic year like no other, Canadian track and field athletes are ramping up for another jam-packed summer of international competition.
Their quest for the podium at the world championships next month in Eugene, Oregon goes through the Township of Langley, B.C. this week as the track and field national championships started Wednesday — a crucial qualifier for athletes still looking to earn their spot onto the Canadian team heading to worlds.
“It’s a totally unique Olympic cycle through to Paris. It’s a unique year having two major championships in the same year. The world championships and Commonwealth Games. That’s never happened in Athletics before,” Simon Nathan, Athletics Canada’s high performance director, told CBC Sports.
For the next five days, upwards of 1,650 able-bodied and Para athletes registered in senior and U20 categories will be competing at MacLeod Athletic Park.
Competition begins with the 10-kilometre and 20km race walk events.
“With the way the World Athletics qualifications work now, there are these points and bonus points. The national championships have the biggest number of bonus points and literally every country in the world is having its national championships this weekend. So there could be a lot of shifting around,” Nathan stated.
Nathan assumed his role with Athletics Canada five years ago. In fact, his first event as high performance director was at the world championships in 2017. He says there are some parallels to then and now, including having some big name athletes missing from action at nationals.
Olympic champion decathlete Damian Warner is out due to a sore knee. Six-time Olympic medalist Andre De Grasse is out with COVID-19. And Mo Ahmed, who won silver in Tokyo in the 5,000m event, is also out due to injury.
“I feel like we’ve been a bit unlucky with some of these issues but in the end you make your own luck. I’d much rather these guys all there. Let’s be honest. Nobody is playing games. They all want to be there,” Nathan said.
“It’s not great but I’m not losing sleep over it.”
Nathan goes on to talk about those 2017 worlds — the first world championship after the 2016 Olympics. He went back and looked at the trials to see what happened in that post-Olympic year.
There were four individual medalists at those Rio Games for Canada. Only one of them would go on to compete at nationals and the world championships that following summer — that was Warner, who would end up placing fifth at worlds.
