After bronze at the worlds, EJ Obiena remains hungry for more in the leadup to Paris Olympics

Onward and upward — this is how EJ Obiena will look to build from a bronze medal finish he achieved on Monday at the World Athletics Championship in the USA.

The 26-year-old is set to return to competition in just a few weeks in Poland for the Diamond League where he'll be going up against familiar foes in Mondo Duplantis of Sweden and American Chris Nilsen.

It will be a busy schedule from that point on for the Filipino pole vaulter as he is also set to test his mettle in Hungary just days after. Obiena, who represented the country in the 2020 Tokyo Olympics, is also looking to suit up anew in the Asian Games and SEA Games, both slated for next year.

All these could lead to Obiena's main goal—to bag a medal in the 2024 Paris Olympics.

"I think that's two years or actually a year and a half from now, I mean that's the plan. That's definitely what I want to achieve," Obiena said in a press conference Tuesday morning.

"Mondo is actually a force to be respected and reckoned with, Chris is a competitor and everybody else in the field so if it's gonna be a medal, I can't say."

Obiena knows the road to an Olympic medal won't be smooth, especially with the level of competition getting higher.

"But definitely, I just proved to myself what I have been saying, that I can compete with these guys and I can win. So hopefully, it will be the same case or even a better case in Paris."

Obiena added that although he finished third in the recent world championships with a historic 5.94-meter outing, he felt he could do more after having missed the 6.0 meters mark in three attempts.

"There's still a lot of things that I haven't won and there's a lot of things that I still want to do in the sport and yeah, I think that's a great motivator to keep moving forward and keep doing what I do," Obiena said.

"I felt like I would be happier winning a bronze medal but then missing that 6 meters makes me feel like there's still things for me to do."

—JMB, GMA News