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Kenyan athlete Faith Kipyegon added another remarkable achievement to her illustrious career, storming to a historic fourth world 1500m title.
The victory extends Kipyegon’s dominant streak to a fifth consecutive global gold medal in the event. The 31-year-old now joins retired men's world record holder Hicham El Guerrouj as the only other athlete in history to amass four 1500m titles at the championships. This latest triumph also marks Kipyegon’s third consecutive world gold, following her third consecutive Olympic triumph last year, after controlling the final race from the very start, before bursting away from her rivals in the final lap.
Not only is the world record holder unbeaten in the past five global finals but, excluding heats, she has not suffered defeat over the distance for more than four years.
Australia's Olympic silver medallist Jessica Hull faded to bronze after attempting to follow as Kipyegon wound up the pace, with Dorcus Ewoi securing a Kenyan one-two. The unstoppable Kipyegon crossed the line in three minutes 52.15 seconds, the chasm separating her from her competitors evidenced by the near three-second wait for Ewoi to follow.
"I just want to thank God," Kipyegon told reporters.
"I knew I was capable of defending my world title after breaking the world record [earlier this year]. I thank God that I was strong today.
"I just wanted to run comfortably without pushes and falls, because I was a little bit scared seeing people falling. I just wanted to be by myself and run my race."
With outstretched arms and a relaxed smile which suggested it had never felt in doubt, Kipyegon celebrated the eighth global gold of her career. That is level with Jamaican sprint star Shelly-Ann Fraser-Pryce - the only other woman to win as many as four world titles in the same event - and distance running great Tirunesh Dibaba for the most by a female athlete in individual events.
Kipyegon will now target a second successive world double in the 5,000m, the heats for which begin on Thursday before Saturday's final.
She became the first woman to achieve that world 1500m-5,000m double two years ago.
Kipyegon has swept seven of the past eight global titles, with Sifan Hassan the last athlete to deny her at the 2019 World Championships in Doha.
