These days, the athletes often cross paths as both train in Florida with well-respected coach Rana Reider. Taylor recently opened his season with a quick 45.73 clocking to finish second in the men’s Indoor 400m at the World Athletics Tour in Fayetteville, Arkansas a few weeks ago.
The outing was the prodigy’s first 400m race since 2019, but he had also surprised many last year with a brisk 10.42 over 100m. De Grasse would, however, not have been among those surprised by the high level of those recent performances.
“He very talented, very, very talented. Sometimes I ask the coach to put me in a workout with him because he is very good for 300 workouts for me when I am preparing for the 200m,” De Grasse told SportsMax.tv’s The Commentators.
“He is very good. He just ran the other day and I am really happy for him. His problem the last couple of years is trying to stay fit and he is very healthy right now and feeling good,” he added.
“It was very impressive (recent run) especially for an indoor season, he’s never done it before, so by the time he comes outdoor he should be in good shape. I’ve been watching him, he’s been in the group for a couple of years now but I think he is taking a lot of things more seriously.”
Listen to the rest of the interview from this week's The Commentators podcast below.
Gardiner’s time of 44.39 was just ahead of the Belgian’s personal best 44.44 in second. Reigning Jamaican national champion Sean Bailey was third in a season’s best 44.93.
Jamaican 2023 World Championship finalists Ryiem Forde and Andrew Hudson finished second in the 100m and 200m, respectively.
Forde’s time in second was 10.17 while Hudson ran 20.56. Both races were won by Canadian Olympic champion Andre De Grasse. He ran 10.10 in the 100m before returning to the track to run a season’s best 20.09 in the 200m.
Olympic champion Lamont Jacobs ran 10.19 for third in the 100m while Great Britain's Nethaneel Mitchell-Blake ran 20.63 for third in the 200m.
In the field, two-time World champion Anderson Peters was third in the javelin.
The Grenadian battled windy conditions to produce a best throw of 78.60m, far behind Germany’s Julian Weber and the Czech Republic’s Jakub Vadlejch who produced 87.26m and 86.06m for first and second, respectively.
The leaders endured a rare quiet outing on Wednesday, with Rio silver medal pairing Huang Xuechen and Sun Wenyan providing the sole silver of the day for China in the artistic swimming.
The USA failed to significantly dent the eight-gold gap from Tuesday, collecting just one gold in the women's 400m hurdles, where Sydney McLaughlin obliterated her own world record as part of an American one-two with defending Olympic champion Dalilah Muhammad.
Muhammad's silver was one of three – all on the athletics track – for the USA as Courtney Frerichs and Kenny Bednarek boosted the medal count – the latter finishing second to North American rival Andre de Grasse in the men's 200m final.
Japan, who led the early gold count in Tokyo, remain in third and added golds through Yukako Kawai in the women's wrestling and Sakura Yosozumi in the women's skateboarding – Japan's third of four possible golds in the debuting event.
Great Britain leaped up from sixth to fourth as Hannah Mills and Eilidh McIntrye secured gold in the women's sailing and Ben Maher became Team GB's second successive showjumping champion, backing up Nick Skelton's win at the previous Olympics.
Australia are tied with Team GB on 15 golds after Mathew Belcher and Will Ryan sailed to victory in the men's 470 to go one better than their runners-up finish at Rio in 2016.
The Russian Olympic Committee make up the top six after Svetlana Kolesnichenko and Svetlana Romashina overcame China's Xuechen and Wenyan in the first of two artistic swimming events to win the Russians' 14th gold of the Games.
Meanwhile, Peruth Chemutai became the first Ugandan woman to win an Olympic medal as she claimed gold in the women's 3,000m steeplechase.
