2024 Men’s World Athletics Track Athlete of the Year: Can Tebogo make history as first African sprinter to win?
Letsile Tebogo made history as the first African to win an Olympics 200m title when he ran 19.46, the fifth fastest time in the history of the half lap event to win at the Paris 2024 Olympics.
Can the 22 year old make another piece of history by becoming the first African 100/200m runner to be crowned World Athletics athlete of the year either in the old, general format or in the specialized format as track athlete of the year?
Many Africans, from Algerian Noureddine Morceli (1994), Ethiopia’s Haile Gebrselassie (1998), the incredible Hicham El Guerrouj from Morocco (2001,2002 and 2003), another Ethiopian, Kenenisa Bekele (2004 and 2005) to Kenyans David Rudisha (2010), Eliud Kipchoge (2018 and 2019) and recently Kelvin Kiptum (2023),but no sprinter has been called up to the stage as the best in the world.
Tebogo has the chance to make that history but the odds are heavily stacked against him as he will be battling five other Olympic champions, including two world record setters for the prestigious honour.
Amrican Grant Holloway and Norwegian, Jakob Ingebrigtsen, broke world records in addition to winning Olympic titles with the former adding a World indoor title to his collections.
Kenyan, Emmanuel Wanyonyi added a Diamond League title to his Paris 2024 Olympic feat in the 800m while the two other Americans in the race, Noah Lyles and Rai Benjamin also made it to the podium in paris.
Lyles won bronze in the 200m in addition to the 100m title he won while Benjamin anchored the American 4x400m relay team to gold ahead of Tebogo led Botswana team.
