Image Credit: The Canadian Press

By Marty Hastings

KATZBERG SMASHES HIS OWN CANADIAN RECORD

Kamloops resident Katzberg enters world record territory, solidifies status as Olympic favourite

Apr 22, 2024 | 12:00 PM

NAIROBI, KENYA — Ethan Katzberg of the Kamloops Track and Field Club dismantled his own Canadian record and recorded the ninth-longest heave in the history of men’s hammer throw to win gold at the Kip Keino Classic on Saturday (April 20) in Nairobi, Kenya.

Katzberg, the 22-year-old reigning world champion, launched the implement 84.38 metres at the World Athletics Continental Tour event — the longest throw in the world since 2008, when Ivan Tikhon of Belarus threw 84.51m.

Mykhaylo Kokhan of Ukraine placed second in Kenya, but was nearly four metres behind Katzberg, with a throw of 80.76m.

The mammoth effort solidifies Katzberg’s position as favourite ahead of the 2024 Olympic Summer Games, which are slated to run from July 26 to Aug. 11 in Paris, France.

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Yuriy Sedykh of the then-Soviet Union holds the mark, with a throw of 86.74m in 1986.

Katzberg, a 6-foot-6, 235-pound Nanaimo product, moved to Kamloops in 2020 to train with Olympic bronze medallist shot putter Dylan Armstrong and learn from expert mentor Dr. Anatoliy Bondarchuk, who won gold in hammer throw for Ukraine at the 1972 Olympic Summer Games in Munich.

Katzberg arrived in the Tournament Capital with a personal-best mark of about 55 metres.

He set (81.18m) and then raised (81.25m) the men’s Canadian record and won gold at the World Athletics Championships last August in Budapest, Hungary.

Katzberg is the youngest-ever men’s hammer throw world champion, the youngest medallist in the history of the world championship and the first Canadian male to reach the podium in the discipline at worlds.

The Canadian record was previously held by James Steacy (79.13m).

Katzberg — who posted on Instagram in March about sponsorship from Adidas — won the 2023 Canadian championship with a throw of 78.73m last summer in Langley.

This past weekend in Nairobi, the moustached man with the Viking visage opened with a throw 81.25m, improved to 82.06m in Round 2, fouled in the third round, threw 81.50m in Round 4, catapulted the winner on his fifth try and completed his series with 83.26m in Round 6.

Katzberg won silver at the 2022 Birmingham Commonwealth Games and gold at the 2023 Pan Am Games in Santiago, Chile.