Mark English finished sixth in the race to decide the best 800 metres runner in the world on Sunday night, the Donegal athlete clocking a personal best of 1:42.78 seconds on the closing night of the World Athletics Ultimate Championship in Budapest.
Djamel Sedjati from Algeria moved from third to first in the last 50m to claim the $150,000 prize for the new ‘ultimate champion’, the largest ever first-place prize in the history of the sport, part of the record $10 million purse on offer across the weekend.
In a race that unquestionably brought together the best of the best, English was sitting back in sixth after the first lap, passed in a fast 49.68 seconds. And despite unleashing another big kick down the homestretch, the European champion couldn’t make up any more ground on the frontrunners.
Marco Arop from Canada was second in 1:42.28 on the same track where he won the 2023 world title. Olympic and World champion Emmanuel Wanyonyi from Kenya, the 22-year-old who has run the fastest time this year with his 1:41.76, was third in 1:42.44.
Running in what was also his first global final, English improved on his previous best of 1:42.97 set in July, and still collected $14,000 for sixth.
Earlier, in cool but still conditions for sprinting, Rhasidat Adeleke was run out of a place in the 200m final, the final event on Sunday night, visibly disappointed after finishing a tired-looking fifth in her semi-final
Starting in lane three, Adeleke had Olympic champion Gabby Thomas and World champion Melissa Jefferson-Wooden, both from the US, in the lanes outside her. A surprisingly slow start left Adeleke chasing them from the gun, her time of 22.81 seconds short of her national record of 22.28 set when winning the European Championships silver medal in Birmingham last month
Only the top four progressed to the final. Sixth coming into the straight, Adeleke finished strongly to blast past Lavanya Williams from Jamaica, but just couldn’t quite close on the four women ahead of her. Fabienne Hoenke from Switzerland, who finished fourth in Birmingham when Adeleke won silver, held on for the last qualifying spot in 22.72.
Thomas took the win in 21.88, with Jefferson-Wooden second in 22.15. After the second semi-final, won by Britain’s European champion Amy Hunt in 22.22, Adeleke ended up ranked 10th of the 15 finishers, which still earned the Dublin sprinter $8,000. Shaunae Miller-Uibo from the Bahamas was disqualified for a lane infringement after originally qualifying for the final, which bumped Adeleke up another place.
Adeleke, who turned 24 at the end of last month, is set to race one more time over 200m this season in London next Friday at the all-women Athlos meeting, where the winners of each event take home $60,000.