India, Aug. 15 -- There are times Mondo Duplantis visualises or jokes about random things he could do with his talent. Jump over a two-storey building perhaps. Maybe across a creek as well. He'd even fancy - God forbid he should ever be in that situation, he adds - an escape from prison.

"I'd probably have the best chance out of anybody if I had a nice stick to jump over the walls," Duplantis said.

Hypothetical prison breaks aside, the pole vault star is busy breaking world records in reality. With seemingly ridiculous ease and astonishing frequency.

The most recent instance came on Tuesday, when Duplantis cleared 6.29m at the Gyulai Istvan Memorial in Budapest to better his 6.28m effort in June. It was the third time he raised his own...