We are waiting a bit with the thought about Duplantis.
Length star Charlotte Kalla recently revealed a training week in May when she trained 22.5 hours, mostly in demanding endurance exercises.
The 400 m hurdles runner Karsten Warholm does not have the same set-up and the rest periods are probably longer between the repetitions, but the time period recorded as training is impressive to say the least: 37.5 hours per week.
All exercises precisely designed to run fast on 400 meter hurdles.
When Norwegian VG visited a training session in Oslo, Warholm stood in the gym and did two lifts of 250 kilos with a specially built barbell in his hands.
For the next season, where the Olympics in Tokyo is the highlight, Warholm has raised the normal dose one week from 35 to 37.5 hours of training.
The coach for many years, Leif Olav Alnes, however, believes that it is even more.
- Most people train two hard weeks followed by an easy one.
We have been driving hard for over a month but now it will be an easy week, says perfectionist Warholm.
Nine hundredths of a world record in Stockholm
He scored 46.87 at Stockholm Stadium in August and thus came in second through the ages.
Only the Olympic champion from Barcelona in 1992, Kevin Young, is ahead with 46.78.
Warholm has also done six of the 13 fastest races in the distance of all time.
- When I was able to run at those times this year with the special conditions that applied, I think it will be an extra boost with competitors and audience, says Warholm who was completely superior in all competitions last season.
He especially misses the challenge from Abderrahman Samba and Rai Benjamin.
Despite the incredible amount of training, he is not worried that it may be too much.
Instead, he feels that the body is getting used to it more and more and that everything he adds has an effect.
Season debut on the coach's birthday
- If the body does not tolerate the training, it is not worth anything, Warholm thinks, who also thinks he knows why he was not chosen Athlete of the Year in the world, an award that went to Armand Duplantis.
- It was two active among the candidates (Duplantis and Joshua Cheptegei) who set world records this year.
So I was pretty sure not to get that award.
If I had set a world record, I would have been able to compete but it is not a "no brainer", says Warholm who plans to make his indoor debut in his own competition at home in Ulsteinvik on January 29, when the extremely important coach Leif Olav Alnes turns 64.