Sideline Story

Yohan Blake aims high for his last Olympics

In this special edition of Sideline Story, we bring you exclusive interviews with Olympians Yohan Blake and Armand Duplantis. Veteran Jamaican sprinter Blake will be participating in his fourth Olympic Games, hoping to win the gold medal in the men’s 100m for the first time in his career. Duplantis is going to Paris as the defending champion in men’s pole vault and the world recorder holder in the sport. How are their preparations looking for Paris 2024? What is their vision for the Games?

Duration:: 10m
Broadcast on:: 26 Jun 2024
Audio Format:: mp3

Hello and welcome to Sideline's Story, your destination for sports news, analysis and discussions. I'm Yang Guan. Wednesday marks the one month countdown to the 2024 Paris Summer Olympic Games. Top athletes are gearing up for the Grand Olympic stage and the dream of winning glories for their countries and regions. For this special edition of our podcast, we bring you exclusive interviews with two renowned Olympians and their vision for Paris. Yuhan Blake of Jamaica is one of the fastest sprinters in the world. He won two 4x100m men's relay gold medals at the Olympics. Blake will participate in the 2024 Paris Games, which he said will be his last Olympics. In the interview with CGTN sports reporter Drew Mandan, he said it's his family that keeps him going. Take a listen. There will be Amy for your fourth Olympics in Paris, and you'll also say this will be your last. So when did you make that decision and why? Only picks come every four years, and you know you want to start your family, and you want to live a life as well apart from truck. I don't want to be there running that long. So this is my last one. You caught the beast for a reason, and tell me if I'm wrong, but it's because your employment team at using bots used to say that you're training extremely hard, and that has taken the toll on you. You've come through some serious injuries. Yeah, it's just because of you seeing the way I train and training, and because he used to training me for over eight or ten years, and he's seen all hard work, and he has to work hard when he's working with me. You would say you're training harder than bots. Easily. Easily I could say that. Yes. Very easy. Do you miss that rivalry? I do, to be honest, because it's fun at the same time, but it's tough at the same time, because you know we're pushing each other. You don't want to lose. You don't want to lose. I don't miss it. It was fun. But you still have a lot of competition nowadays. What's your view on the future competitions or in Paris? You know, it's a wide open race in Paris, to be honest. You know, the times that I was running back then, they're not running it now. So it's not better, it's just for me to be better, and to just aim, and just go there and deliver. There's a lot of young fast guys, I'm happy, but I'm not worried. I've been there. I've done that. It's that you've done that, you've been there, and you've been training for so many years. How many years have you been, I'm training, day after day on the field? Well, many times I look at it and it's over close to 20-something years. You know, I've been working really hard to stay at the top, to be at the top, and to be the second fastest man on the planet, so it's a lot of work, and I've been training for over our close to 20-something years. Did you ever get tired of this repetition? The moment I get tired, I will stop. So I don't, that feeling doesn't come inside of me. I try to enjoy what I do, I get up every morning, want to do the work. Your family is your motivation for this book? I would say, yes, in training, what kept me going is my family. You know, the desire for helping people, because I don't just run for me. I run for a lot of persons, my mom, you know, and a lot of poor people back home as well, so that's what kept me going. This is what I have to do to take the amount of poverty, so to me they can have a life and can enjoy happily ever after, a fairytale's won. And there's the gun, Carter for Jamaica, Kimmons for the U.S. Your Tyson game for the U.S., you'll hunt Blake for Jamaica. It's the U.S. and Jamaica right together, and here's Baldwin Bailey side-by-side through the home straightaway, and both edges ahead, both running away across the line, Jamaica, U.S. World bracket! You have two Olympic relay gold medals, so would you say it's more of a motivation or do you run faster when you're competing relay races, because you were representing your country? Yeah, you tend to put up more, because our dominance over the really has been great, and you want to give everything. But when you run for yourself, you run harder for me, to me, but when you're running for a country, yes, you run hard, but not like when you run for your own individual medal. You know, Chinese sprinter soup in Pian, he's the same age, yes, he's the same age as you. Do you have anything to say to him? Of course, I have no soup from my first Olympics in London, me and Sue was in the same race. You know, me and Sue had been running from where little, you know, and I look up to Sue and it was a really great athlete, and I just want to say, keep working hard, Sue. I believe in you, I know you have done so many things for China, world-endure, 60m and outdoors 9.8m, which is really great to continue working hard, I know last year was a bit tough for you, but be strong. Finally, what's your goal for Paris 2020? There's no goal, there's only dreams, and my dream is to finish on top. Is there a time in your mind, a number? There's as long as I win. The time doesn't matter for me anymore, because I've done the times, you know, it's just for me to go there and get that made out. How's CGTN Sports reporter Drew Mandan speaking with the Olympic champion, you hummed like? Swedish athletes, Amanda Plantis is the current world outdoor and indoor record holder in Mans Polvald. He's hoping to defend his Olympic title from Tokyo this summer. Drew Mandan caught up with him about the upcoming Olympic journey for the Plantis. Can I call you Mandan? Please. Please call me Mando, yeah. Plovulting is a competition within yourself, and against yourself. You know, I know that whenever I step on on the track, I should be the best. It's about their new classes, Drew Mandan's record, and he's done it, and with a world record from the greatest poll voter, our sport has ever seen. Oh-ho-ho! Does it get again? Six feet and twenty feet. The love is a world feature, yet again. What you believe? The love is a world feature, yet again, what you believe is a wonder unto the world. I've been Mando since the very beginning, and it's just the name that I identify myself as, and I just like it, so I stick with it. You have so many titles on you. How do you stay ambitious and very motivated while still on the sport? I just really love it. I just really love it. I love doing it. I'm still very passionate about it. I love pushing myself and seeing what I can do, and I just still care about it. I don't really know how to explain it. I just get out on the track, and I just want to be the best version of myself, and I want to do the work. Plovulting is a competition within yourself, and against yourself, in the first place. Whether you're going for a world record, or whether you're going for third place, or you're just a beginner, it doesn't really matter, because you're just competing against the bar, and you're trying to as high as you possibly can on that given day. So for me, it's no different, whether I feel like I'm competing for the world record, or competing for a place, it doesn't really matter. It's all kind of the same thing in a way. It's more just mentally however you approach it, and I always approach every meet the same. I just try to jump as high as I possibly can. It just happens that now I'm getting good at it, and now the high heights can be world records. So yeah, there's that. Hey, everyone, I'm honored to plan this world record holder in the Plovult and Olympic champion. See you guys in Paris. How confident are you that you can defend your title in Paris? Yeah, I don't have any doubts in my mind. I feel very confident about it, and I try to really think negative, and I know that whenever I step on on the track, I should be the best, because that's just the kind of jumper that I am, and that's just kind of the confidence that I have in my jumping ability. So I don't think it should be any different when it comes to Paris. I think that I should be the guy that jumps the highest. I would like to jump over 6.30, but that's just because it sounds cool. But other than that, I don't really stress about it so much. I know that I can jump higher, and I want to jump higher, and I want to keep trying to push the barrier of what's possible for myself, but it's nothing that I really stress about day in and day out. You have been Plovulting ever since you have the ability to walk, I think. Not everybody that has a childhood hobby, and then it goes to his lifelong career and being so successful. How do you feel about that? Yeah, I mean, I'm in a fortunate situation, I guess, to be able to have started Plovulting so, so young, and to be able to take it where I've taken it, and no, I'm so grateful for the situation that I was, I guess, brought up in, because, you know, Plovulting is not as accessible for everybody as it was for me. My father built the entire setup in the backyard, and I'm so grateful for that, because I don't think I'd be where I am today without that, and, you know, I can't really think. I'm enough. Are you excited that Paris is hosting the 2021 Olympics? Yeah, I mean, Paris is, Paris is beautiful, Paris is beautiful, and, you know, I love, I love going to Paris. Hopefully, it can be even more special this time. We can walk away with a gold medal, and then they can join Paris even more afterwards, so I think it'll be a little bit super nice. That was a CGTN Sports Reporter, Juma and Dan speaking with the Plovult Olympic Champion Armand Duplantis. That's it for the special edition of sideline story. Please subscribe to find out more of our conversations with the top Olympians for the Paris Games. You can also find our shows at radial.cgtn.com. Until next time, see you. [music] [music] [BLANK_AUDIO]