World athletics championships: Sweden’s Armand Duplantis breaks pole vault world record

There is winning and then there is Armand “Mondo” Duplantis. Winning the pole vault gold for Duplantis is just a preliminary.

For Australia’s Kurtis Marschall, who has had the misfortune of having a career that collides with the peak of the greatest the sport has ever seen, that has meant a second successive world bronze medal and the joy to be witness to watching up close the Swede take the sport to literal new heights.

Marschall’s effort needs to be put into that context. Finishing third when you are jumping against the greatest the world has ever seen – by a long margin – is like trying to impress Shane Warne with your leg spin. His bronze is not diminished by that it is enhanced.

In other eras Marschall would have won more than bronze.

In the steam of Tokyo’s national stadium Dupla