Damian Warner

Childhood

Damian Warner and his two younger siblings grew up with their mother, Brenda, in London, Ontario. Damian helped raise his younger sister and brother while his mother worked at two retirement homes. Damian’s father, Kevin Warner, separated from Brenda when Damian was young; he worked on a cruise ship out of Barbados and was estranged from Damian’s family.

High School Athlete

Damian Warner was not active in organized sports until the age of 15. In high school, he played football and basketball and idolized Toronto Raptors star Vince Carter. Warner’s greatest basketball accomplishment was representing London’s Montcalm High School at the Ontario provincial high school basketball championship.

When Warner was 17, his basketball coaches encouraged him to try track and field. An unmotivated student, Warner joined the team mainly because it allowed him to miss classes for tournaments. At the 2007 Ontario provincial high school track and field championships in Ottawa, he won the bronze medal in the men’s long jump with a jump of 6.99 m.

Move to Decathlon

After graduation, Warner did not pursue football or basketball. His high school basketball coaches, Dennis Nielson and Gar Leyshon, believed he had the patient mentality and overall skillset to excel in the decathlon. It combines ten events (100 m, 200 m, 110 m hurdles, 1500 m, long jump, high jump, shot put, discus, javelin and pole vault) over two days. Competitors win points in each event and are ranked in order of their total overall points.

Warner had enjoyed some success in triple jump, long jump and high jump, but had never dominated in a single event. He competed in his first decathlon at age 20 at the 2010 Canadian Track and Field Championships in Toronto. He finished in second place with 7,449 points, 331 behind the champion, Jamie Adjetey-Nelson. Warner was initially disappointed with his result, but came to believe that if he could post 7,449 points despite his inexperience and other factors like poor weather, there was the potential to see his overall results improve.

Early Decathlon Promise

A year later, at the 2011 national championships in Calgary, Warner won the gold medal with 8,102 points — a 653-point increase from the previous year. He was slightly better at the 2012 national championships with a score of 8,107 points. He was 93 points below the Canadian Olympic qualifying score of 8,200 points, but he was still selected to the 2012 Canadian Olympic team because of his potential. At the 2012 Olympic Summer Games in London, England, Warner finished an impressive fifth place with a personal best score of 8,442 points.

International Competition 2013–18

In 2013, Warner won his third consecutive Canadian championship. He also won his first of a record six Hypo-Meetings in Götzis, Austria; as well as a bronze medal at the World Athletics Championships in Moscow. Warner became only the second Canadian to medal in decathlon at the World Championships, following Michael Smith, who won silver in 1991 and bronze in 1995.

The next year, Warner won the decathlon title at the 2014 Commonwealth Games in Glasgow. He became the third Canadian to win gold in the decathlon at the Commonwealth Games following Smith (1990, 1994), and Adjetey-Nelson (2010).

At the 2015 World Championships in Beijing, Warner won silver and set a Canadian record with 8,695 points. He was behind only American Ashton Eaton, who broke the world record with 9,045 points. Warner also won the gold medal that summer at the Pan American Games in Toronto, where he set a new Canadian record with 8,659 points.Warner’s first Olympic medal came a year later at the 2016 Olympic Summer Games in Rio de Janeiro, where he won bronze. He became the second Canadian to win an Olympic medal in decathlon, following Dave Steen, who won bronze at the 1988 Olympics in Seoul.

At the 2017 World Championships in London, England, Warner contracted norovirus and struggled to finish fifth. A year later, he won a silver medal in the men’s heptathlon (same as decathlon but without discus, pole vault and the 1500 m) at the IAAF World Indoor Track and Field Championships. However, he struggled at the 2018 Commonwealth Games. He was unable to post a result in the pole vault and withdrew after eight events.

International Competition 2018–21

In September 2018, Warner returned to his hometown of London to train after spending two years in Calgary. He reunited with his five-member coaching team led by his high school coach, Gar Leyshon, who took a leave of absence from teaching to coach Warner full-time. Warner told CBC at the time that he needed to be surrounded by those who knew him best to achieve his goals. The positive results were immediate; they included a gold medal at the 2019 Pan Am Games, a fifth career win in Götzis, and bronze at the 2019 World Championships in Doha, Qatar.

Beginning in March 2020, the COVID-19 pandemic proved to be a major challenge for Canadian athletes training for the 2020 Summer Olympics, because it led to lockdowns and public restrictions. However, Warner was able to train in an old, unheated hockey arena in London that was provided by the city. Warner’s coaches and various volunteers spent three weeks customizing the space; they rigged tarps to catch javelins and discuses and constructed a pole vault runway, a long jump pit, and a running track made from sheet metal and leftover synthetic surface from the 2015 Pan Am Games in Toronto.

When international competition resumed in 2021, Warner was better than ever. He won his sixth Hypo-Meeting in Götzis with a score of 8,995 points. He also set men’s decathlon world records in the 110 m hurdles (13.36 seconds) and in the long jump (8.28 m).

2020 Olympic Summer Games in Tokyo

Warner was in top form going into the Olympic Summer Games in Tokyo, which were delayed until 2021 due to the pandemic. He went on to post an Olympic record with 9,018 points. He had an Olympic best time among decathletes in the 110 m hurdles (13.46 seconds) and tied his own decathlon world record in the 100 m (10.12 seconds). His long jump of 8.24 m would have been good enough to win bronze in the men’s long jump. For winning the first ever Olympic gold medal for Canada in the decathlon, Warner was selected as the flag bearer for Canada in the closing ceremonies.

In 2021, Warner was awarded the Lou Marsh Trophy as Canada’s athlete of the year, as well as the Lionel Conacher Award as Canada’s top male athlete of the year. He was also inducted into Canada’s Walk of Fame as part of the class of 2021.

Personal Life

Warner graduated from the Business Foundations program at London’s Fanshawe College in 2010. His long-time partner, Jennifer Cotton, is a retired national track teammate who competed in hurdles and heptathlon. Cotton moved to Calgary with Warner in 2016–18 and returned with him to London. She gave birth to their son, Theo, in March 2021. Warner has credited the birth of his son with helping to improve his mental focus and perspective as he trained for the Olympics.

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Tokyo 2020 Decathlon Results

Selected Medal Record