With talented young Chinese athletes all laced up and ready to pit themselves against a stacked field of elite champions, the world’s premier track and field series has guaranteed fans a thrilling season opener in China.
The World Athletics Diamond League’s 2026 curtain-raiser, to be held in Keqiao of Shaoxing city, Zhejiang province, on Saturday, promises to deliver a spectacular showpiece, with China’s best sprinters, jumpers and throwers raring to challenge the world’s top stars — more than 20 Olympic and world champions, including as many as six world record holders — in front of a home crowd.
And, offering just enough time for pulses to return to normal, a week later in Xiamen, Fujiang province, on May 23, they do it all again, capping off the season’s tone-setting doubleheader.
Leading the star-studded international cast confirmed for the Shaoxing leg are Sweden’s two-time pole vault Olympic champion Armand “Mondo” Duplantis, men’s 400m hurdles world record holder Karsten Warholm of Norway and the fastest women’s 100m hurdler in history Tobi Amusan of Nigeria.
A highly popular overseas star among Chinese fans, Duplantis, who just set his 15th and latest world record of 6.31m at an indoor meet in southeastern Swedish city Uppsala in March, will open his outdoor season in a loaded men’s field that also includes Greece’s Emmanouil Karalis, who moved to second on the athletes’ world ranking in February with a 6.17m clearance in Athens, and two-time world champion Sam Kendricks of the United States.
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