On Monday night time on the 2023 World Athletics Awards in Monaco, Kenya’s Religion Kipyegon took residence high honours, capping off her almost flawless season. The double world champion was named World Feminine Observe Athlete of the 12 months, a title awarded to her by the general public, her friends and the World Athletics Council.

World Athlete of the 12 months – Girls’s Observe 👑

Religion Kipyegon 🇰🇪 is your World Athlete of the 12 months for monitor occasions 👏 #AthleticsAwards pic.twitter.com/Tuw6RGAf8t

— World Athletics (@WorldAthletics) December 11, 2023

Kipyegon made headlines by breaking three world information within the 1,500m, mile, and 5,000m occasions, along with clinching two world championship titles on the 2023 World Athletics Championships in Budapest. She efficiently defended her world title within the 1,500m and received her first world championship over 5,000m, dealing with one of many deepest fields within the occasion’s historical past.

This historic achievement marks the primary time a Kenyan girl has obtained the distinguished award since its inception in 1988. The earlier winner was U.S. 400m hurdler Sydney McLaughlin-Levrone in 2022.

All through 2023, the 29-year-old mom pushed the boundaries of distance operating, carrying out feats that followers of the game thought-about almost unimaginable. Kipyegon turned the primary girl to finish the 1,500m in underneath three minutes and 50 seconds (3:49:11) and achieved one other milestone by additionally changing into the primary girl to run a sub-4:10 mile, clocking in at 4:07.64 at Monaco Diamond League in July.

For the primary time ever, World Athletics cut up the Athlete of the 12 months award into three disciplines: monitor, discipline and non-stadia.

Six athletes – Tigist Assefa, @mondohoss600
, Kelvin Kiptum, Religion Kipyegon, @LylesNoah and @TeamRojas45 – have been introduced as World Athletes of the 12 months for 2023.#AthleticsAwards press launch ⬇️

— World Athletics (@WorldAthletics) December 11, 2023

Yulimar Rojas of Venezuela received the Girls’s Discipline Athlete of the 12 months, successful her fourth consecutive world championship title within the ladies’s triple bounce and her third-straight Diamond League title. New ladies’s marathon world file holder Tigist Assefa of Ethiopia received the non-stadia award. Assefa shattered the ladies’s world marathon file on the 2023 Berlin Marathon, operating an unbelievable 2:11:53, breaking the earlier file by almost two and a half minutes.

World Athletics mentioned in a press launch that their determination to divide the award into three classes got here from followers and council members once they commented that it was “extremely laborious” to restrict the vote to only one athlete.