The 2024 calendar year was an eventful one for Athletics particularly as it had the biggest event in the Paris 2024 Olympics.
The global sporting event is incomplete without setting remarkable feats and records and Afrosport takes a lot some of the most noteworthy individuals and the moments that set them apart.
Moments of the year
Tebogo claims historic 200 metres Olympic gold
Letsile Tebogo was destined for greatness when he won 100 metres gold at 2021 and 2022 World Athletics U20 Championships in Nairobi and Cali respectively.
What followed was silver and bronze medals in the 100 metres and 200 metres event at the 2023 World Athletics Championships in Budapest.
With continuous improved times, it was only going to get better for Botswanan and made history at the 2024 Paris Olympics where he won the 200 metres gold medal ahead of American favourite Noah Lyles.
Tebogo became the first athlete from Botswana to win an Olympic gold medal to which the country’s government declared a public holiday to celebrate the feat.
What’s more is that Tebogo was named a World Athletics Male Athlete of the Year and Male Track Athlete of the Year to cap off an astonishing year for the 21-year-old.
Kipyegon wins third consecutive 1500 metres Olympic gold
Faith Kipyegon has been holding it down in the women’s 1500 metres and 5000 metres nearly a decade.
The 30-year-old Kenyan however stole headlines when she won gold in both events at the 2023 World Championships in Budapest.
It put her in the spotlight to repeat the feat at the Paris 2024 Olympics and while she could only take the silver medal behind compatriot Beatrice Chebet in the 5000 metres, Kipyegon shone in the 1500 metres and became the first athlete male or female in the category to win three consecutive gold medals (2016, 2020, 2024).
She was also victorious in the 1500 metres Diamond League final in Brussels.
Ruth Chepngetich smashes marathon world record
Marathon running is one of the toughest categories in athletics as it is run over a gruelling distance of 42 kilometres.
For someone like Ruth Chepngetich, she raised the bar to an incredible level when she won the 2024 Chicago Marathon and broke the women’s marathon world record with a time of two hours, nine minutes and 56 seconds.
What set the Kenyan apart was that she became the first woman to go below the two hours 11 minutes and two hours 10 minutes mark, making her time all the more incredible and something that might remain for a while.
Personalities of the year
Sifan Hassan
When it comes to the long distance categories, Hassan is undoubtedly a class apart.
Her historic feat at the 2020 Olympics in Tokyo is still fresh when she won an unprecedented treble of medals in the women’s 1500 metres (bronze), 5000 metres (gold) and 10,000 metres (gold)
The Ethiopian-born Dutch runner took it up at notch at the Paris 2024 Olympics when she claimed gold in the marathon and became the first athlete male of female to win Olympic gold in the 5000 metres, 10,000 metres and marathon.
Hassan was ultimately awarded as the World Athletics Female Athlete of the Year.
Julien Alfred
The stars aligned for Alfred when she claimed the women’s 100 metres gold medal at the Paris Olympics ahead of American Sha’Carri Richardson.
Alfred became the first-ever Olympic medalist for Saint Lucia and the achievement was celebrated with the Saint Lucia government declaring September 27 as Julien Alfred Day.
Beatrice Chebet
Kenyan long distance sensation Chebet had a year to remember after she beat both Faith Kipyegon and Sifan Hassan to Olympic gold medal in the 5000 metres and 10,000 metres races.
Chebet, who also set the 10,000 metres world record at the Prefontaine Classic in Eugene, became only the third woman in the history of the Olympics to win gold in the two long distance categories.
