Andre De Grasse set for earlier start to Olympic year with indoor event in Kazakhstan

Andre De Grasse is set for an earlier start than usual this season.

The six-time Olympic medallist sprinter is competing in the 60 metres at the Astana Indoor Meeting in Kazakhstan on Saturday. It will be just his third time taking part in the indoor season since turning pro in 2015.

"Just to see where I'm at early, get some rust off," the Markham, Ont., native said. "You know, work on my start, work on my acceleration, work on the first part of my race, because that's going to be crucial.

"I don't want to wait until April to run, [I want to] test out how the training is going and how the body's feeling. There's a lot of early adjustments that I want to make, I don't want to leave it too late."

De Grasse, who also raced indoors as a pro in 2016 and 2021, said injuries affected his season last year.

"I wasn't able to start my season the way I wanted to, we started pretty late and then I had to answer up and get ready for Canadian nationals and then get ready for world championships," he said. "So everything kind of came fast and I just thought I wasn't prepared in you. So right now I'm healthy and I just want to see where I'm at before I get into the rigorous part of training."

The 60 metres in Astana is one of two indoor races De Grasse is scheduled for at the moment, along with the Millrose Games in New York on Feb. 11.

He holds a personal best of 6.60 seconds in the 60-metre event from February 2015. He ran a 6.61 in his lone indoor race in 2016 and 6.79 in 2021, the latter in which De Grasse finished sixth.

"From me doing that one indoor race, I knew where I was and what I needed to do," he said. "It was like, 'All right, I got left in the blocks I need to go back and work on my reaction, work on making sure I'm