Ethan Katzberg is Canada’s hammer throw king

PARIS — Ethan Katzberg stepped into the circle, facial hair totally on point, flung the hammer 84.12 metres, and might as well have walked over to the podium, sat down on the top step and twirled his duster for an hour or so. On this night, and on many others before it, there was nobody in his league.

He’s the hammer throw king; world champion for a year now, Olympic champion for all time. You think the field was intimidated by his first throw, the one that beat them all by at least four metres, and was almost 11 metres clear of the athlete in last place? How about the fact that he’s 22-years-old? He might dominate this event for a decade. He most certainly changed his life in the instant that big old ball landed with a golden thud in the grass at Stade de France.

“I can call myself an Olympic champion for the rest of my life, and that’s a really special moment,” he said. “And, you know, I’ll always remember this day. It was incredible.”

When he shows up in top form, as he did here, there is nobody in Katzberg’s league. That in itself is almost hard to believe. There were former world and Olympic champs left in his dust. Four metres clear of the field? Who does that?

“He’s in the best shape of his life, so he knows that he can throw that far,” said his coach Dylan Armstrong. “And I told him to try and take control right away so that everyone, you know, maybe tenses up a little bit. I think they did, obviously. So, when somebody throws 84 meters, it’s like people start thinking, well, who’s going to come second and third now?”

Bence Halasz of Hungary managed 79.97 metres to collect silver. Mykhaylo Kokhan of Ukraine won a surprising bronze with a heave of 79.39 metres.

Katzberg stood out, just as he did at the 2023 worlds in Budapest, where he won. He opened the season at 84.38 metres, a mark that still stands as the world’s best this year. He’s been basically untouchable for years and his ascension has been nothing short of meteoric. He’s a technician and an athlete, blessed with speed and power to spare. Armstrong saw that in him when he first laid eyes on the lanky, skinny basketball player from Nanaimo, B.C.

“I saw a tall, lanky kid that just had a ton of speed, very, very fast in the ring,” said Armstrong, who trains his star pupil in Kamloops, B.C. “And that’s what I was looking for. I’m like, if I can put some muscle and some weight on this kid, I think I can get him throwing far.”

While some critics point out Katzberg’s apparent lack of gym strength, they miss the fact that he’s hammer strong. Until he chucks it 84 metres. Then they figure it out.

“I think people have the wrong idea,” said Armstrong. “I mean, you have to be strong, but you don’t have to be like crazy strong. You’ve got to be hammer strong. And there’s a difference between hammer strong and being gym strong and Ethan’s hammer strong. And he’s got that nice, flexible, long muscle, stretchy muscle. That really works for the hammer.”

Katzberg might own the world record in due time. He needs two more metres. He didn’t have that in him on Sunday, and he doesn’t know what it takes. But you don’t have to stretch the bounds of imagination to see it happening eventually.

“I don’t know what it feels like to throw 86 metres,” said Katzberg, when asked about the quest. “I’ve got to keep training. I’ve got to keep my head down and focusing on the improvement.”

The world record belongs to the late Yuri Sedykh, who set the mark of 86.74 metres for the Soviet Union. His coach at the time was Dr. Anatoliy Bondarchuk, the man who coached Armstrong to shot put silver. Katzberg has grown so quickly in the shade of that coaching tree. He’s a great student, a hard worker, and he listens without hesitation to everything Armstrong tells him.

“You know, I’ve got to give a lot of thanks to my prep man over there, Dylan Armstrong,” said Katzberg. “He got me ready for this. We prepared for this for a whole year. It was the only thing we were thinking about, and to be able to throw 84 and bring home the gold felt really good.”

They spent 65 days in Portugal in the winter. It was the right environment, distraction-free and warm weather. They didn’t go to the Barcelona pre-Games camp, where most Canadian track and field athletes did, opting instead for a place in Leverkusen, Germany. They liked the food. And it wasn’t as hot. And they have hammer specific facilities. When you throw it as far as Katzberg does, that’s a concern. He threw 84 plus to open the season, which was a bit of a surprise.

“He really trained hard over the winter,” Armstrong said in May. “We did some great things together. There were some indicators in training. I thought maybe not that large of a number, but we don’t really put a limit on Ethan. We don’t talk numbers. We don’t set goals as far as distance. I think the sky is the limit with Ethan. He’s in control of that. I think he’s going to be able to throw as far as he wants to.”