Seb Coe: World Athletics to review controversial new athlete awards format
World Athletics President Seb Coe in his Monaco office during his conference call with global athletics journalists on December 18, 2023.
What you need to know:
- The previous format also came with a cash award of $100,000 (Sh15.4 million in today’s exchange rates) for each of the men’s and women’s athletes of the year.
- Last year, Sweden’s Duplantis and USA’s 400 metres hurdler Sydney McLaughlin-Levron were the world male and female athletes of the year.
World Athletics President Seb Coe says the world track and field governing body will review its controversial new athlete awards format that steered away from the traditional proclamation of overall, outright male and female athletes of the year.
At its 2023 World Athletics Awards in Monaco last week on Monday, World Athletics introduced a new format where they named six winners across various competition categories, a departure from a 34-year-old tradition.
The six athletes, namely Ethiopian marathoner Tigist Assefa (women’s out of stadia), Swedish pole vaulter Mondo Duplantis (men’s field), Kenyan marathoner Kelvin Kiptum (men’s out of stadia), Kenya’s track star Faith Kipyegon (women’s track), US sprinter Noah Lyles (men’s track) and Venezuelan triple jumper Yulimar Rojas (women’s field), were named World Athletes of the Year for 2023.
Kenya’s World Under-20 Championships gold medallists Faith Cherotich (steeplechase) and Emmanuel Wanyonyi (800 metres) were also named women’s and men’s rising stars for 2023 at the awards ceremony.
“The depth of talent and the outstanding performances in our sport this year more than justify the expansion of the World Athletics Awards to recognise the accomplishments by these six athletes across a range of disciplines,” explained Coe during the awards ceremony at the Palace of Monaco’s Prince Albert.
“Our World Athletes of the Year alone have achieved seven world records between them in 2023, as well as a host of world titles and major wins, so it is only fitting that they be recognised as the athletes of the year in their respective fields,” he added.
However, the new format met with criticism from athletics enthusiasts with some athletes, including USA’s multiple world sprints champion Noah Lyles, also questioning why the change.
“I believe I found the right words for what happened at the AOY awards,” Lyles said on X (formerly Twitter).
“It made me feel that none of our achievements were good enough to be AOY… I’m guessing that was not WA’s goal but that is how it made me feel.”
But speaking during his traditional, wide-ranging end-of-year conference call with global athletics journalists, Great Britain’s track legend Coe said the new format was arrived at in concert with athletes, adding that even Lyles was consulted.
“It’s interesting because the athletes that I spoke to and that we communicated to, along with the athletes’ representatives and managers all wanted to impress upon us that the sport wasn’t just one discipline,” Coe responded to a question from Nation Sport.
“And they were very keen – Noah himself was very keen – to have our sport recognised and to have different disciplines reflected and that’s what we tried to do…”
Coe noted that, just like other facets of management at World Athletics, his organisation would, in the next two weeks, review the new format.
“Look, at the end of everything – whether it’s our administration, our competitions, the way we do our business – we review everything and so we will look at that…
“But I know that we were trying very much to reflect what our athletes were telling us.
“But not everybody can win everything they think they are gonna win, and that’s the nature of an open vote.
“You as journalists had a vote, the athletics family had a vote, my (World Athletics) Council had a vote, and it was open to public voting as well, and they will all take a particular view…
“We will review it in the next few weeks and see what we learn…
“But what we were trying to do was to reflect the fact – and the athletes and athletes’ commission made this point to me as well - that we are a sport of many different disciplines and we are not just about track and that’s what we were trying to reflect.
Eliud Kipchoge - powered by his sub-two-hour marathon and a world record over the distance in Vienna and Berlin - and David Rudisha, riding on the back of two brilliant, back-to-back world records in the 800 metres within a week in Berlin (one minute, 41.09 seconds) and Rieti (1:41.01), are the only Kenyans to have won the overall, outright Athlete of the Year titles, Kipchoge twice in 2018 and 2019 and Rudisha in 2010.
The previous format also came with a cash award of $100,000 (Sh15.4 million in today’s exchange rates) for each of the men’s and women’s athletes of the year.
Last year, Sweden’s Duplantis and USA’s 400 metres hurdler Sydney McLaughlin-Levron were the world male and female athletes of the year.
