The Oslo Diamond League produced Norwegian Karsten Warholm‘s comeback, a new world’s fastest woman in 2023, the fastest female teenage mile ever and a new second-fastest American man in 1500m history.
Start with the Olympic champion Warholm, who ran the fourth-fastest 400m hurdles in history (46.52 seconds) in his first time racing the event in nine months. Warholm, the world record holder at 45.94, was seventh at last July’s world championships after tearing a hamstring in a race a month and a half earlier.
Warholm instantly becomes the favorite for this August’s worlds in Budapest. Olympic and world silver medalist Rai Benjamin, the second-fastest man in history, has reportedly dealt with a quad injury since running 47.74 and 47.78 in April and May. Reigning world champion Alison dos Santos of Brazil, the third-fastest man in history, is uncertain to compete this season after February knee surgery.
“Today shows in the right circumstances, I can really attack the world record, maybe even this year,” Warholm said, according to meet organizers.
Full Oslo results are here. The Diamond League next stops in Lausanne, Switzerland on June 30, live on Peacock.
Also Thursday, Ivorian Marie-Josee Ta Lou won the 100m in 10.75, displacing American Sha’Carri Richardson as world’s fastest woman this year by one hundredth. Ta Lou, 34, has been chasing the top Jamaicans for nearly a decade. She was fourth at the last two Olympics and owns world championships silver and bronze medals.
The women’s 100m picture for August’s worlds is a bit unclear given neither world champion Shelly-Ann Fraser-Pryce nor Olympic champion Elaine Thompson-Herah has raced a 100m yet this year.
The 17-year-old Ethiopian Birke Haylom became the fastest teenage female miler in history, winning in 4:17.13. She broke the world U20 record set by Zola Budd in 1985. Cory McGee was second in 4:18.11 and Nikki Hiltz fourth in 4:18.38 to become the third- and fourth-fastest Americans ever behind Mary Slaney and Jenny Simpson.
Norwegian Jakob Ingebrigtsen, who last Friday broke the two-mile world record, broke his own European 1500m record by clocking 3:27.95 to become the sixth-fastest man in history. Yared Nuguse was third in 3:29.02 to become the second-fastest American ever behind Bernard Lagat (American record 3:27.40).
Ethiopian Yomif Kejelcha and Ugandan Jacob Kiplimo each ran the fifth-fastest 5000m in history -- 12:41.73. Kejelcha won in a photo finish.
Dutchwoman Femke Bol clocked 52.30 to win the 400m hurdles in the world’s best time this year. The 15 fastest times in history have been recorded in the last four years among Americans Sydney McLaughlin-Levrone (world record 50.68) and Dalilah Muhammad (best time 51.58) and Bol (best time 52.03).
McLaughlin-Levrone has a bye into the 400m hurdles at August’s worlds but may choose to race the flat 400m instead, should she finish in the top three in that event at July’s USA Track and Field Outdoor Championships to make the team. Muhammad ran the 400m hurdles once this year, a 55.72 on May 28 to rank outside the top 30 in the world in 2023.
American Erriyon Knighton won the 200m in 19.77 seconds, his best time since taking bronze at 2022 Worlds to become the youngest individual sprint medalist in championships history at 18. Knighton is third-fastest in the world this year behind American Noah Lyles (19.67) and Nigeria’s Udodi Onwuzurike (19.76).
South African Wayde van Niekerk, the 2016 Olympic champion and world record holder in the 400m, won in 44.38 over a field that included 2022 World bronze medalist Matthew Hudson-Smith of Great Britain (fifth, 44.92) and Tokyo Olympic silver medalist Anthony Zambrano of Colombia (eighth, 46.45).
Van Niekerk, second-fastest in the world this year, has worked his way back from tearing an ACL and meniscus in his right leg playing celebrity tag rugby in 2017. He missed the 2019 Worlds, was eliminated in the Tokyo Olympic semifinals and placed fifth at the 2022 Worlds. Van Niekerk can become the first man in his 30s to win a world 400m medal since Michael Johnson‘s last world title in 1999.
Olympic champion Valarie Allman lost for the first time in seven discus competitions this year. Dutchwoman Jorinde van Klinken upset her with a 66.77-meter throw. The American Allman, who threw 66.18, still has the 12 best throws this year.
Olympic and world champion and world record holder Mondo Duplantis prevailed over the strongest men’s pole vault field this year. He cleared 6.01 meters, topping Olympic and world silver medalist Chris Nilsen (5.91), world bronze medalist E.J. Obiena (5.81) and 2017 and 2019 World champion Sam Kendricks (5.71).
Olympic champion Wojciech Nowicki of Poland launched the world’s top hammer throw this year -- 81.92 meters -- to beat a field that included all three men who made the podium at the Tokyo Games and the 2022 World Championships.
Nowicki supplanted American Rudy Winkler as the 2023 world leader. Winkler, seventh at the Olympics and sixth at 2022 Worlds, was second Thursday at 79.42 meters as he looks in August to become the first American man to win a world hammer medal. The men’s hammer is the only men’s or women’s field event where the U.S. has never won a world championships medal.
Venezuelan Yulimar Rojas, the Olympic and world champion and world record holder in the triple jump, had the closest win of her undefeated Olympic cycle. Rojas leaped 14.91 meters, edging Cuban Leyanis Perez Hernandez by four centimeters. It was the first time Rojas did not break 15 meters at a top-level meet since August 2020.
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