European athletics has already published their shortlist of the athletes of the year and World athletics will not be far behind. So it is time for me to present mine, since, if I publish it before WA I will get to make comparisons of our respective choices.
The year has been a very good one. Coming back from the disaster of 2020 the athletes have offered us a season full of great spectacle and records. The Tokyo Olympics were a success despite the extreme restrictions under which they had to take place. There was a slew of new olympic champions and a few who managed to keep their crown.
The best female athlete of the year, for me, is S. McLaughlin. She broke the 400 m hurdles world record, twice, and won the olympics in a race of at least equal quality to the one of 2019 in Doha, which saw D. Muhammad win in a world record.
(Muhammad gets an honourable mention in the best athlete of the year's list. And let's not forget that both she and McLaughlin obtained a gold medal in the 4x400 m relay).
S. Hassan is second. Had she won her bet of three olympic gold medals she would have been at the top of my list. However in Tokyo she could win only the 5000 and 10000 m, getting bronze in the 1500 m. It's an incredible performance and if anybody has the potential to duplicate Zatopek's feat (he won the 5000, 10000 m and marathon at 1952 Olympics) that's Hassan.
A. Wlodarczyk is on the podium of the year's best. Her third consecutive olympic gold is a first for women. Wlodarczyk has been my 2017 athlete of the year. And she has been pointedly ignored by World Athletics despite the fact that she has dominated her discipline like none other. Let's hope that WA will not wait for a fourth olympic medal before honouring this great champion.
Past the first three there is no order among the athletes of the top list. E. Thompson won her second olympic sprint double and this time, obtained a third gold with the jamaican 4x100 m relay team. Her 10.54 s time is, for me, the world record for the 100 m.
J. Camacho-Quinn dominated the season in the high hurdles and capped it with the olympic gold (a proper redemption after her fall in Rio).
P. Jepchirchir had made my top-three list last year. Had the competition been less fierce this year she would have been again on the podium. Be that as it may she proved once more that she is the best semi and marathon runner by winning the olympic event under taxing conditions.
Y. Rojas was named World Ahletics athlete of the year in 2020 (an absurd decision if there is any). This year she might have merited this title had there been fewer great champions ahead of her. Still, I included her unhesitantly in my top list after her olympic win cum world record performance. And she has improved her style a little bit.
V. Allman made my last year's list mainly thanks to her potential. A potential that she fully realised this year. She won the Olympics and improved her best with a 71.16 m throw. And I really like her style.
M. Lasitskene, who is the best high jumper of the recent years has at last added the olympic gold to her collection. She had lost the occasion to obtain gold in Rio because of the exclusion of Russia from international sport. I just cross my fingers for the harsh punishment of the russian federation to end.
F. Kipyegon dominated the 1500 m, and obtained a second olympic gold four years after Rio. She is a great miler and her presence might push Hassan towards longer distances.
This completes my top-ten list. However I would like to add a honourable mention of S. Miller and N. Thiam. Both added a second olympic gold medal to their collection and, in the case of Miller, accompanied by a superb personal best of 48.36 s in the 400 m.
K. Warholm is my choice for athlete of the year. Not only did he dominate the 400 m hurdles but he went on to win the Olympics in an out-of-this-world record of 45.94 s and he dragged along the other finishers to fantastic performances. He was third in my last year's list.
R. Crouser showed that he is the best shot putter and, having won also in the Rio Olympics, is on his way to join the legends of throws. While the other elite throwers have just progressed, Crouser has really exploded and has now 7 of the 10 best throws of all times.
D. Warner occupies the third place in the list. I followed closely his decathlon in Götzis where he was deprived of a 9k+ record due to fouling his first throw in the javelin. He went after this barrier-breaking peformance in Tokyo, despite a below-par high jump. After a long career with plenty of honourable positions he is at last a well-merited number-one.
A. Duplantis was number one in my list last year. Had be broken the world record he would have occupied the same position for the second year in a row. Be that as it may, he figures in a prominent position in my top list. It is rare to see somebody so young dominate so thoroughly his discipline.
Speaking of young competitors, the next one in my list is J. Ingebrigtsen. From the outset, nobody doubted his great talent but the question was whether he could stand up to the kenyans. Now we have the answer: he can beat them. It was great to see him win gold at 20-something years of age.
E. Kipchoge is the best marathon runner ever and won the olympic crown in Tokyo hands down. It's a pity that he came to the marathon a little bit too late. It would have been great to see him win a third olympic medal in the distance, somebody nobody else has done.
M. Tentoglou is part of the top list and not only because he is greek. He won the (indoor) Europeans and the Olympics this year, the latter in a memorable, suspenseful competition and holds the year's leading performance. Way to go, Milto!
J. Cheptegei would have been competing for a place among the first three in my list of year's best had he won the 10000 m race (a race he lost due to a major tactical blunder). Be that as it may, he has his place among the ten best.
I have been watching A. DeGrasse since his collegiate career. I was convinced of his great talent but was worried when he hurt himself in 2018. Some athletes never manage to come back from injury. Not so DeGrasse. And in Tokyo he showed that he is ideed Bolt's heir in the 200 m.
J. Vetter's inclusion in my top list may surprise some readers in view of his way-below-par performance in Tokyo. However after having realised the problems with the run-up area I understood that athletes like Vetter who have fine-tuned their style may be completely thrown off by a bad surface coating. (I will, one day, write about throwing areas and their problems). Vetter is the only 90+ performer of the year.
I don't know if World Athletics will, like last year, give up on the rising star distinction. If they do I will, in 2022, imitate them. However for this year I will present my choice.
The female rising star of the year is A. Mu. She dominated the olympic 800 m and won a second gold with the US 4x400 m team.
I hesitated a lot between F. Bol and Mu for the first place opting finally for the latter. But F. Bol, bronze medalist in the 400 m hurdles, could very well have been first in the rising star category.
K. Hodgkinson completes the podium of the female rising stars. In just one season she went from practically unknown to one of the best 800 m runners, winning silver behind Mu in Tokyo.
The male rising star of the year is E. Knighton. He qualified for the Olympics at just 17 years of age and went on to finish 4th in the 200 m final.
French (ex Australian) S. Zhoya is a most promising high-hurdler and an excellent pole-vaulter. I will be watching closely his transition from 99 cm to 106 cm hurdles.
Slovenian discus thrower K. Ceh is a tad old (22) to be counted as a rising star but since European Athletics included him in their list, I may as well do the same. After all, throwers are maturing later than the other athletes and his 70+ personal best looks most promising.
Finally I have a special mention for G. Tamberi and M. Barshim. When they decided to share the gold medal they gave everybody a great lesson that athletics is above all a school of friendship and fair-play.
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