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: Wednesday, September 17th at 6:30am ET on Peacock and USA

Semifinals: Thursday, September 18th at 8:24am ET on Peacock and USA

Final: Friday, September 19th at 9:22am ET on Peacock and USA

Top contenders: With the announcement of Olympic champion Gabby Thomas’s withdrawal due to injury, a 100m/200m double gold looks more doable than ever for either Julien Alfred or Melissa Jefferson-Wooden. In this instance, Alfred may have the edge as the Olympic silver medalist who has a slightly longer resume over 200m, but with the way Jefferson-Wooden has leveled up this year, it feels silly to judge solely based on her past performance.

The reigning champ is Shericka Jackson, who at her best can threaten the legendary world record in this event but only has a 22.17 season’s best. She’s trending in the right direction, though, winning her most recent race at the Silesia Diamond League, and the 200m is historically her stronger event. The other two strongest medal contenders by recent results are Anavia Battle, who finished second at USAs and won four DL races this season, and Brittany Brown (USA), the Paris bronze medalist who most recently won the Diamond League final ahead of Battle and others.

Dark horses: This might be Great Britain’s best bet for a sprint medal, as they have two legitimate contenders in the form of 2019 World champ Dina Asher-Smith and up-and-comer Amy Hunt. But the cross-Atlantic battle still favors the Americans, as Thomas’s withdrawal means last year’s NCAA champ McKenzie Long gets the fourth spot (thanks to Brown’s DL wild card), and Long is one of only three sub-22 runners so far this season having run 21.93 at the Ed Murphey Classic.

One good stat: What’ve you done for me lately? Shericka Jackson’s 21.41 PB is a full three-tenths of a second ahead of Julien Alfred’s world lead, but Alfred’s 21.71 is nearly half a second ahead of Jackson’s 22.17 season’s best.