ERNEST JOHN “EJ” OBIENA and Armand Duplantis meet again five days after their duel in Budapest at the Zurich Wanda Diamond League at the Letzigrund Stadium in Switzerland.
The tournament starts Thursday (Manila time) and Obiena said he’ll not settle for silver or bronze.
“I don’t enter in any competition to be No. 3 or No. 2,” he told BusinessMirror on Wednesday. “I want to battle it out and win, that’s what I am supposed to do.”
There’s no rest for the world championships gold and silver medalists, who made Sunday’s men’s pole vault final at the Hungarian capital a virtual one-on-one duel.
Duplantis, the Olympic champion and world record holder, bagged gold with his leap of 6.10 meters, while Obiena cleared 6.0-flat for the silver. Australian Kurtis Marschall and American Chris Nilsen, silver medalist at the Tokyo Olympics, shared the bronze at 5.95m.
“No break for me,” said the 27-year-old Obiena, who flew directly to Zurich from Budapest. “The good thing about Zurich is we’ll [Duplantis, Marshall and Nilsen] be seeing each other again.”
Also expected in Zurich are American KC Lightfoot and Sam Kendricks, both members of the elite 6.0 meters club at 6.07 and 6.06, respectively, as well as Belgian Ben Broeders, Frenchman Thibaut Collet, American Zach Mcwhorter and Turkish Ersu Sasma.
“It’s going to be the Diamond League where all great competitors meet,” said Obiena, who’s already qualified for Paris for having cleared the Olympic qualifying standard of 5.82 meters last July 2 at the Bauhaus-Galan in Sweden.
