With world record still on mind, Barshim opens season today

Olympic and World champion Mutaz Barshim has not given up his dream of breaking the long-standing high jump world record. In 2018, he was just millimetres away from bettering Cuba’s Javier Sotomayor’s feat of 2.45m which has stood since July 1993.But Barshim – who had earlier in 2017 became the first athlete in history to clear 2.40m in five consecutive years and remained unbeaten that season – suffered a career-threatening foot injury on his third attempt at 2.46m at the Gyulai Istvan Memorial meet in Hungary. But that painful setback has not deterred Barshim from achieving his ambition of creating a new world record. While the 31-year-old has sights on winning gold at the Paris Olympics next year and an unprecedented fourth high jump world crown in Budapest and Asian Games later this year, Barshim has Sotomayor’s 30-year-old record in his mind."I always aim for the maximum,” said Barshim yesterday, on the eve of the Diamond League season opener at Qatar SC’s Suheim Bin Hamad Stadium. "I am still active and while I am active, I will keep chasing the best possible. There is nothing like that I can’t achieve. If you don’t believe it, go home, don’t be here.”Barshim said events like the Diamond League ‘is sort of training’ for him because he has ‘bigger goals’. "So I am up for the big fish and that’s for me are the World Championships, the Olympics and the Asian Games this season,” he said without a hint of arrogance."I only look at myself, to be honest. I’m in a different stage of my life, in my career, even though you know where you are. But deep down you don’t know because you always surprise yourself. There’s always that extra that you’re trying to reach and grab. And I say it’s a great opportunity to go and grab for extra and to focus on what I need to be focused on because I know the season is so long and I have my own targets,” he added.The Qatari has competed sparingly in recent years, mainly due to various injury concerns, but he has managed to get it right when it matters, winning the past three world titles as well as the Olympic title in 2021.In his first competition of the season, Barshim jumped 2.20m to take gold at the relatively weak field at the West Asia Athletics Championship in Doha last week. He last competed at a higher level in September 2022, so it remains to be seen what kind of form he is currently in, but he isn’t easy to beat.World indoor champion Woo Sanghyeok of South Korea beat Barshim in the Doha meeting last year, so will be the closest challenger to the home favourite today. USA’s JuVaughn Harrison also heads to Doha in great form, having already cleared 2.33m this year."It’s the start of the season. Definitely, I’m excited. Not only to compete but compete at home,” said Barshim. "The start of the season is very important to all of us athletes. Again, you know, competing at home for me is definitely extra boost and I’m looking forward to that.Meanwhile, World 100 metres champion Fred Kerley will be one of 15 reigning Olympic and world champions competing in the first of 14 top meetings that make up the Diamond League.Kerley will race the 200 metres in Doha, which will also feature Olympic 200m champion Andre de Grasse of Canada – who also had an injury-stricken 2022 – and Americans Michael Norman, the world 400m champion, and Olympic and world 200m silver medallist Kenny Bednarek. In the women’s 100m, reigning world 200m champion Shericka Jackson of Jamaica will take on Britain’s former world 200m champion Dina Asher-Smith.Kenya’s two-time Olympic and world 1500m champion Faith Kipyegon headlines the women’s 1500m. She said she was "really excited” to start another world championship year.Olympic and world champion Katie Moon will take on fellow American Sandi Morris and Australian Nina Kennedy who she beat to the women’s pole vault title in Eugene last year.The strongest field of all in Doha is the men’s 3000m. Three months on from his world indoor 3000m record, Lamecha Girma takes on the same distance outdoors and faces a field that includes four winners of global titles. The Ethiopian clocked 7:23.81 in Lievin in February and hasn’t raced since. A lack of prior races didn’t seem to do the Ethiopian any harm back then, so the fact this is his outdoor season debut shouldn’t necessarily work against him.Especially as the same applies to many other athletes in the field, including world and Olympic steeplechase champion Soufiane El Bakkali. The Moroccan is more at home when jumping over barriers, but he is speedy enough on the flat to be competitive in a race such as this.Olympic 10,000m champion Selemon Barega, 2021 Diamond League 5000m champion Berihu Aregawi and fellow Ethiopians Getnet Wale and Telahun Haile Bekele add further depth to the field, as do 2019 world 1500m champion Timothy Cheruiyot, world U20 cross-country champion Ishmail Kipkirui and Oceanian record-holder Stewart McSweyn.The meeting record of 7:27.26 has stood for 12 years, but there are several athletes capable of challenging that mark today.