"My headband flew out halfway" - Kenny Bednarek on his successful season-opener at Miramar Invitational 2024

American sprinter Kenny Bednarek recently shared his joy at his stunning season-opener at the Miramar Invitational. The 25-year-old won the gold medal in the 200m race at the Ansin Sports Complex.

Kenny Bednarek rose to fame in 2020 after he won the silver medal in the 200m race at the Tokyo Olympics and continued impressing the sports world with another silver medal at the 2022 World Athletics Championships. Bednarek last competed at the Diamond League in Brussels. He ended his 2023 season by clinching the gold medal in the 200m race, clocking an impressive 19.79s and leaving behind his competitors Andre De Grasse and Zharnel Hughes.

Recently, Bednarek kickstarted the new season on April 6 at the Miramar Invitational. After winning the gold medal at the championship, the Olympic athlete shared his happiness on his X (formerly known as Twitter) handle.

He shared a video of him running the 200m race at Miramar and wrote,

"Won my Season Opener in the 200m today with 20.35s (-2.8) at the Miramar Invitational 🥋 My headband flew out halfway"

Moreover, Bednarek managed to surpass second-placed Christian Coleman at 20.43 and Jamaican Rusheen McDonald in third place with 21.09s timing.

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Kenny Bednarek aims at winning gold after clinching silver at the 2020 Tokyo Olympics

Kenny Bednarek at Athletics - Olympics: Day 13

In the 2020 Tokyo Olympics, Kenny Bednarek lost the 200m gold medal to Andre De Grasse by a margin of .06s, as the Canadian surpassed Bednarek's time of 19.68s by clocking 19.62s.

After the 2020 Tokyo Olympics experience, Bednarek has aimed to bag the gold medal in the upcoming Paris Olympics 2024.

During an interview with TMJ4 earlier this year, he reflected on his last Olympics, where he nearly clinched the gold medal in 200m, which prompted him to become even more motivated to win a gold medal.

"It adds motivation because I was that close to getting the gold that one time,"

That experience pushed Bednarek to find ways to improve his performance as his goal was to become number one.

"So every time I see it? You know it's always like dang, I almost had it. So now what do I gotta do different to get it this year. It's out there for display and it's a constant reminder of what I could have had back then. But now, it's the goal to get this year. And being the second fastest is nice, but I wanna be the number one. So far the past couple years it's eluded me. The goal is to get number one and you know stay on top when I get there."

He also added that the Covid situation in 2020 made it weird for him to compete as he highlighted the importance of the presence of his family and friends.

"The whole Covid situation kind of made everything a little bit weird. You know, we weren't able to have family and friends out there."

However, he is optimistic about his chances of converting his silver to gold this time and fulfilling his goal.