It's 'Canada against the world' in men's 200m sprint at Botswana Golden Grand Prix

Jerome Blake insists there's no chirping but rather a business-like approach to this week's track showdown with sprint teammates Andre De Grasse, Aaron Brown and Brendon Rodney.

They won world championship gold in the 100-metre relay last summer, but the batons will be tucked away Saturday when they'll be foes for about 20 seconds in the men's 200 metres at the Botswana Golden Grand Prix.

"Canada against the world," Blake declared to CBC Sports via email after arriving in Gaborone just before midnight local time on Tuesday. "We haven't talked about [facing each other]. We all have different things we are focused on.

"I'm sure it will be nice going against each other this early in the season, [maybe] what Canadian [Olympic] trials might look like [in late] July. But my focus is trying to run the best race I can."

Scheduled for 10:23 a.m. ET, Saturday's 200 will be available on CBCSports.ca, the CBC Sports app and CBC Gem. Live stream coverage of the World Athletics Continental Tour Gold meet begins at 8:30 a.m.

Rodney is the only Canadian in the race to have competed at the distance this season, having clocked 20.42 for fourth place earlier this month at the Miramar Invitational in Florida. The 31-year-old from Etobicoke, Ont., also posted a 10.17 personal best in the 100 on March 25 in Kingston, Jamaica.

They ran their first 4x100 of the year at the Florida Relays in Gainesville on April 1 in a winning time of 37.80, only 32-100ths of a second off their world performance last July in Eugene, Ore.

"To run [that] fast this early is shocking because we're going to continue to improve," Brown told CBC Sports recently. "None of us felt super sharp. I know Andre's still getting back to 100 per cent [from a foot injury last