Marileidy Paulino stated she had been working hard towards winning her first World Athletics Championships gold medal which she finally did in the women’s 400 metres final in Budapest on Wednesday.
The 26-year-old Dominican was a silver medalist from last year’s championships in Eugene likewise at the 2020 Olympics in Tokyo that included silver in the Women’s 4×400 metres relay.
Paulino was however a class apart in Wednesday’s final in the absence of injured American Sydney McLaughlin-Levrone and Shaunae Miller-Uibo who is currently nursing her first child, and raced to a national record time of 48.76 seconds.
The 26-year-old finished ahead of Poland’s Natalia Kaczmarek and Sada Williams of Barbados who took the silver and bronze medal in a time of 49.57 seconds and 49.60 seconds respectively
“This national record means a lot to me,” Paulino said. “It is really incredible, but I have been preparing for this for a long time, working hard to achieve a goal like this.
“The gold medal was my dream, and I had the talent to turn this dream into reality.”
Paulino is Dominican Republic’s first female athlete to win a world title and the country’s first world champion since Felix Sanchez in 2003.
