By Matt Hardy
The World Athletics Championships starts this weekend with the best and brightest track and field stars descending on Budapest in Hungary.
And while the British contingent will be eager for medals, everyone else will too.
Here are four athletes from outside of Britain to take note of over the next 10 days.
Shericka Jackson (Jamaica)
Jackson continues to impress and is the fastest in the world this year after clocking 10.65 seconds over 10 metres at the Jamaican championships.
It put her joint fifth on the all-time list, 0.16 seconds off Florence Griffith-Joyner’s 35-year-old world record.
Jackson won silver in the 100m at last year’s Worlds and will be gunning for Shelly-Ann Fraser-Pryce’s title this time around.
Wayde Van Niekerk (South Africa)
The 2016 Olympic and 2017 world champion has fought back from a ruptured ACL, which he suffered playing a charity touch rugby game in 2017.
His 400m time of 44.17secs puts him second on the list this year, behind Zambia’s Muzala Samukonga.
He missed the 2019 World Championships and failed to reach the 400m final at Tokyo 2020 but finished fifth in the final at last year’s Worlds.
Mondo Duplantis (Sweden)
The Swede broke his own world pole vault record at last year’s Championships in Eugene, clearing 6.21 metres, and registered 6.22m earlier this year to increase the mark.
Duplantis, who was born in the United States, is also the reigning European outdoor and indoor champion to hold all the major titles available to him.
It would be a major shock if the 23-year-old was beaten in Budapest.
Femke Bol (Netherlands)
A world-leading time of 52.30secs in the 400m hurdles has the 23-year-old clear favourite for the title.
With Sydney McLaughlin-Levrone having withdrawn from the competition, the path is clear for Bol to improve on last year’s silver.
A bronze in Tokyo and last year’s European gold in Munich marks Bol as one of the world’s best.
Nick Mashiter, Press Association
