Jamaica’s Tajay Gayle, after winning the long jump at last year’s IAAF World Championships of Athletics, is now making a serious push at earning a spot at the Olympic Games in Tokyo, Japan as a sprinter.

Gayle showed he was not joking when he said he might try the sprints when he turned up at the Milo Western Relays last week but could only manage a fifth-place finish in a race won by former World Record holder over 100 metres, Asafa Powell.

The placing and the time, 6.87 seconds, is not a deterrent to Gayle, as he went into the race without any significant expectations.

 “The time doesn’t really matter, I would have been satisfied with anything, even 7.0. I’m just here to get competition and experience in sprinting,” said Gayle in an interview with Jamaican Newspaper, The Gleaner.

According to Gayle, the idea that he could be making the Olympic team as both sprinter and long jumper is something that is the brainchild of his coach Paul Francis.

Francis is playing the situation by ear, saying sprinting is a part of jumping, so the process of racing would always have been included in his traditional training.

But he isn’t ruling out the possibility though.

“I can’t predict the future, we’re just trying our best to prepare him. And what will happen will happen at the Trials,” said Francis, coach at MVP Track Club and brother of the famous Stephen Francis.

Gayle though is already finding it difficult to straddle the two events, saying he hasn’t been able to work on certain technical issues like his start because he has had to focus on his jumping.

“Within technical sessions, I’m doing jumps while others are sprinting, so I don’t get the chance to work on it a lot,” he said.

Despite that, the World Champion believes his coach knows what he is capable of, even better than he does.

"If my coach says I can do it, I guess I can," he said.