By Mitch Phillips

TOKYO (Reuters) – Canada’s former Olympic decathlon champion Damian Warner, one of only four men to surpass the 9,000 points mark, withdrew from the world championships event before it started on Saturday after failing to recover from an Achilles injury.

Warner, 35, won Olympic gold in 2021 at the Tokyo Olympic Stadium and had been desperate to try to match that with world gold after collecting two silvers from his eight previous appearances.

However, his lane remained empty for the opening 100 metres in another huge disappointment for him, after he crashed out of the Olympics last year after three no-heights in the pole vault.

The man who took his title in Paris, Norway’s Markus Rooth, is also absent with injury, leaving the competition intriguingly open.

Rooth’s co

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