Quai Antoine [Monaco], Nov 24 : Eliud Kipchoge and Dalilah Muhammad have been named the male and female World Athletes of the Year at the World Athletics Awards 2019, held at the Grimaldi Forum here on Saturday.
29-year-old Muhammad broke the world record in the 400m hurdles twice this year, first with a 52.20 performance at the US Championships in July to eclipse a mark which had stood since 2003.
Muhammad broke it again at the World Athletics Championships Doha 2019, clocking 52.16 in one of the championships’ most eagerly-awaited finals to claim the world title for the first time. Muhammad also won world gold in the 4x400m relay and won five of her seven races.
Kipchoge, the winner of the award last year, added to his phenomenal marathon CV in 2019. In April, he captured his fourth victory at the London Marathon with a 2:02:37 course record, the third-fastest performance of all time.
The 35-year-old Kenyan followed up in October by blasting through the distance’s two-hour barrier with a 1:59:40.2 performance at the Ineos159 Challenge in Vienna.
Male Rising Star – Selemon Barega
The 19-year-old Barega was the silver medallist in the 5000m at the World Championships and finished fifth in the senior race at the World Cross Country Championships Aarhus 2019. The Ethiopian also produced world U20 leads at both the 5,000m and 10,000m with 12:53.04 and 26:49.46 respectively.
Female Rising Star – Yaroslava Mahuchikh
Mahuchikh, the 2017 world U18 champion, continued her ascension into the high jump elite at the World Championships where she twice broke the world U20 record, first with a leap of 2.02 metre and again with a clearance of 2.04 metre to secure the silver medal. The 18-year-old also won the European U20 title.
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