Canada's Damian Warner sits 4th after opening day of men's decathlon in Paris
Defending Olympic champ trails Germany's Leo Neugebauer
Damian Warner believes it's better to be the hunter than the prey heading into Day 2 of the Olympic decathlon.
The London, Ont., native finished the first of two days of the decathlon in fourth place on Friday at Stade de France with 4,561 points after five events.
Germany's Leo Neugebauer holds the top spot on the leaderboard with 4,650 points, with Puerto Rico's Ayden Owens-Delerme (4,608) and Norway's Sander Skotheim (4,588) right behind.
"You either have a feeling of catching up or a feeling of kind of fending off all the competitors," he said. "Both positions have a pressure but it's a lot easier to be the chaser than be the person in the front."
"I'm a chaser tomorrow, I start off with my strongest event, the hurdles. Just gotta come out strong and go from there."
Day 2 will begin Saturday morning with the 110-metre hurdles and end Saturday night with the 1,500.
The 34-year-old Warner is looking to repeat as Olympic champion after setting a Games record of 9,018 points in Tokyo three years ago.
He started out strong with the 100 but took a hit with his shot put, finishing 10th of 11 in his group with a top throw of 14.45 metres. Warner acknowledged he's been inconsistent with the event over the years.
"There's a lot of ups and downs, a lot that I can pick at and wish I could've been a little bit better," Warner said. "That's the decathlon for you, there's gonna be some ups and downs, some ebbs and flows but the cool thing about the decathlon is it's not done in one day, it's done in two."
"You have to change your mindset and kind of leave it in the past or else it can be like an anchor and pull you down," he added. "Shot put was not good, there's no ifs, ands or buts about it. It's just kind of like, it sucked, now you just gotta move on and don't let that mess me up."
