World record holders Mondo Dupantis and Karsten Warholm are set to race over 100m on Sept. 4, Zurich Diamond League organizers announced.

Here’s what you need to know:

– Duplantis is coming off a 6.25m pole vault clearance to defend his Olympic title in Paris. He owns a 100m personal best of 10.73s as a high schooler in 2018. He also ran a wind-aided 10.57 (+2.1m/s wind) that same outdoor season. Duplantis has not raced on a flat track since then.

– Warholm, the 400m hurdles world record holder and three-time world champion, just took silver in the 400m hurdles behind Team USA’s Rai Benjamin at the Paris Olympics. Warholm’s personal best is 10.49 from 2017.

– The race is set for Wednesday, Sept. 4th at Letzigrund Stadium in Zurich, Switzerland. The Diamond League meet will be held the following day.

Our take:

With the Olympics behind us, as fans of track and field, typically we’d be left to ponder life’s big questions, like “what if so-and-so raced what’s-his-name at a weird distance?” This sort of hypothetical is usually just that – a mind game batted back and forth between running dorks during an easy run. But the day before the Zurich Diamond League meet, we’ll put speculation to rest, and turn our attention to two actual titans of track duking it out in a sprint.

Karsten Warholm and Mondo Duplantis are set to race a one-on-one 100m dash on Wednesday, September 4th. Going off personal bests is probably not the way to determine a favorite here, as Warholm’s comes from 2017 (10.49), and Duplantis set his 10.57 PB as a high school senior in 2018. 

Instead, let’s take a more holistic view of the matchup. Both are likely faster in a pure speed sense than they were six or seven years ago. That said, Warholm’s event relies more on maintenance of near-top speed than the ability to gun it for 10 seconds, and he appears to be more of a strength-based 400m hurdler. (Rai Benjamin’s PBs over 100m is 10.03, for instance, run back in 2020.) Meanwhile, have you ever watched Duplantis hit the runway? He’s regarded as among the fastest – if not the fastest – vaulters on the circuit. His acceleration and strength is unquestionable, but you don’t start your pole vault approach out of blocks. When was the last time this guy practiced a true drive phase?

It should be a close finish. Our predictive speculation is that Warholm will be technically better out of the blocks but Mondo’s top speed will be much higher and they’ll meet near the finish line. Neither of these dudes would have agreed to race the other if they didn’t think they’d win. If all goes well, maybe we can round up a handful of Scandanavians and have them both double back to the 4 x 100m next year! But regardless of who places first on the track this time, the real winner will be us… the fans, who love this crap and are gonna be clamoring for more of it.

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