SPIKES Performance of the Day 8
The results are in and, not too surprisingly, you have voted Ashton Eaton breaking his own decathlon world record as your Performance of Day 8 of the World Championships.
The American received 63.57% of the overall votes, to win over the other two nominees almost as convincingly, as he did beat his competitors during his world record-breaking performance. Going into the final event of the decathlon, the 1500m, he knew he needed a time 4:18.25, which in the Beijing heat and after having competed in nine events already was never going to be easy.
Thanks to a last lap sprint, he went 0.73 quicker to take the title with 9045 points, bettering his previous world record by 9 points.
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Of course cheering on your favourite athletes at the world championships is one thing, but we want the fan experience to go further than that.
The IAAF, in conjunction with Official Partner adidas, is asking you, the fan, to vote for your favourite performance of each day. After every evening session, a panel of experts will pick three athletes, who in any shape or form grabbed their imagination and will leave it to you to choose the winner.
Today’s shortlist is nothing short of incredible. A world record, a double distance don and a high flying comeback.
Ashton Eaton
There is no other word to describe this man but superhuman. After setting a decathlon world record in 2012, the American tonight surpassed his own record mark with a remarkable 1500m-finish to finish two gruelling days of competition with a historic 9045 points. Needless to say he defended his world title from Moscow with this mark.
Mo Farah
‘It doesn’t count, if you can’t repeat it’, or something like that should be Mo’s motto. Anything short of double gold would probably be a disappointment for the newly crowned 5000m world champion after he already collected 10,000m gold on the first night of the championships. His finish to hold off a strong Caleb Ndiku in 13:50.38 was more than convincing, let alone the fact that this was his third global distance double.
Blanka Vlasic
The queen is back. She may not have won the title tonight, but seven years after taking silver at the Beijing Olympics and years of injuries, the Croatian showed her class again. Clearing 2.01m in her first attempt and only losing out to Maria Kuchina on count-back is an achievement in itself, but the fact she has now cleared 2.00m or higher a gobsmacking 106 times, just sounds out of this world.