It’s nearly time for the Big Show in Tokyo! The CITIUS MAG crew is flying halfway across the globe to bring you the best of track and field from Japan starting Saturday, September 13th—or Friday the 12th if you’re living on the American side of the International Date Line.

There’s plenty of running, jumping, and throwing on tap for the 2025 World Athletics Championships, and we’ll have minute-by-minute coverage and daily live shows and newsletters all along the way. You can find a full schedule with entries and live results here. To kick things off, we’re giving you event-by-event previews of every competition on tap for Tokyo so you head into the weekend with all the latest insight and analysis.

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How to keep up with all of CITIUS MAG’s extensive coverage of the World Championships – powered by ASICS:

• 🎥 CHAMPS CHATS - We will be streaming our post-race show live on YouTube at the conclusion of every evening session in Tokyo (AM in America) featuring Chris Chavez, Eric Jenkins, Anderson Emerole, Paul Hof-Mahoney and more from the CITIUS MAG team.
• 🎧 CHAMPS CHATS | Will immediately be available to stream, download and listen as a podcast on Apple Podcasts + Spotify or wherever you get your shows on The CITIUS MAG Podcast feed. Exclusive interviews with athletes will also be published as podcasts.
• 🎧 We will have episodes of Off The Rails live from Tokyo | Apple Podcasts + Spotify
• 📬 Daily newsletters, so be sure you’re subscribed to the CITIUS MAG Newsletter
• 🎦 Post-race interviews on the CITIUS MAG YouTube channel.
• 📲 Follow along for all updates, news, results and more on X and Instagram.
• 📆 Bookmark our full schedule of events here.
• 🏃 If you’re in Tokyo, join us for group runs with Asics on Sept. 12th and Sept. 19th. Details here.

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Schedule + How To Watch

Heats: Monday, September 15th at 6:35am ET on Peacock and USA

Semifinals: Wednesday, September 17th at 8:30am ET on Peacock and USA

Final: Friday, September 19th at 8:15am ET on Peacock and USA

Top contenders: There are three names and three names only on this list: American Olympic champ Rai Benjamin, Norway’s 2023 World champ Karsten Warholm, and 2022 World champ Alison dos Santos, of Brazil. Warholm is the world leader at 46.28, but all three have taken wins over the other at various points in the season. Dos Santos beat Benjamin at the Prefontaine Classic, Benjamin beat both dos Santos and Warholm in Stockholm, and Warholm set the world record over 300m in Oslo.

In all likelihood, the battle for gold will come down to Benjamin and Warholm, and it may take a historic performance to secure the win. But dos Santos may have benefitted from working on his flat speed for Grand Slam Track, so don’t count him out by any means. The razor-thin margins between all three (and the huge gap to the rest of the world) are what makes this a can’t miss event.

Dark horses: The best of the rest this season has been Qatar’s Abderrhaman Samba, who clocked his fastest times back in 2018 but is still only 30 years old and got close to his PB earlier this summer with a 47.09 run behind Benjamin in Paris. He also finished second behind Warholm in the Diamond League final, notably ahead of NCAA champ Ezekiel Nathaniel, of Nigeria, who may be his closest competitor outside the podium favorites.

Americans Caleb Dean and Chris Robinson have identical season’s bests of 47.76, and they’ll likely need to improve on those marks to contend for a medal, but Dean’s PB of 47.23, set last year, could get the job done if someone else falters. And the other main name worth mentioning is Kyron McMaster (British Virgin Islands), who claimed a surprise silver at Worlds in 2023, but he’s only raced twice this year and has a season’s best of 49.07, so don’t count on him heading into Worlds at 100 percent.

One good stat: It’s been nine years since someone not named Karsten Warholm, Rai Benjamin, or Alison dos Santos took global gold. That race, the 2016 Olympics, was won by American Kerron Clement, and although Warholm (the only one of the Big Three competing) didn’t even make the final, he set a then-national record of 48.49 in the prelims.