After picking up his third Trinidad and Tobago Olympic Committee (TTOC) Sportsman of the Year award at the 2025 ceremony, Keshorn Walcott expressed how winning his first-ever World Championship medal has brought him relief heading into 2026.
He said, “It’s been a breeze, you know, starting my training (for 2026) knowing that I’ve added this accomplishment after so long. Compared to last year, it’s a lot easier, and I am a lot more confident and comfortable. So I believe that 2026 will be a good year.
As the year unfolds, Walcott will target at least three major competitions.
“We have the Commonwealth Games and the CAC Games, and also the Ultimate Championship, which is a new competition under World Athletics,” he said.
“Those three competitions will be the major ones outside of the Diamond Leagues, of course. So yeah, the main focus is to win those competitions, and I’m really trying to throw over 90 metres again. I think that’s going to be the goal for 2026.”
Walcott, 32, was also T&T’s most outstanding athlete in the previous year. Having recovered from an Achilles injury just in time to qualify and compete at the 2024 Olympic Games in Paris. Walcott stunned the world in his debut Olympic appearance in London in 2012 and followed up with bronze in Brazil four years later.
On each of his previous global medal-winning javelin journeys, Walcott also walked away with the TTOC nod.
“Nothing, nothing compares to the first one,” he said after the ceremony. “It’s the Olympics! 2012 was everything. I don’t think anything, even a medal, even an award, anything that comes close to 2012, I don’t think they will ever match up, you know.”
It took the star six attempts in 12 years to win a World Championship medal, with a men’s javelin gold medal on Sept. 18, 2025, in Tokyo, Japan.
“I went to every world championship believing that it wasn’t for me, you know, because most of the time, every world championship, I would have some sort of injury, some sort of problem. But (this time) I just really believed that it was possible. We just needed to make some small changes. We just needed to actually find something that works, and I believe that I found that. I made a switch with my coaching. I’m now training with Dr Klaus from Germany,” he explained.
“I took a risk, you know; as they say, no risk, no story. I think that in early 2025, I wasn’t sure how the season would go, but things really came together. And I have to put everything down to trusting my coach.”
Walcott also copped the Senior Male Athlete of the Year award and the Most Outstanding Male Field Athlete award at the National Association of Athletics Administration (NAAATT) awards ceremony on Jan. 3.
