After five golds from the Kenyan women in Tokyo, Emmanuel Wanyonyi got the men on the board in a thrilling 800m final at the 2025 World Athletics Championships on Saturday (20 September).
Wanyonyi led from the start at a strong pace, just as he did in the Olympic final at Paris 2024. Defending world champion Marco Arop came to his shoulder in the home straight, but Wanyonyi dug deep to repel the Canadian’s challenge. The 21-year-old would not be passed with Djamel Sedjati finishing fastest of all to take silver.
Having beaten beat Arop by one-hundredth of a second in Paris, Wanyonyi’s winning margin over Algerian Sedjati was four-hundredths this time with Arop a further five-hundredths back. The time was a new championship record of 1:41.86, nearly half a second quicker than Donavan Brazier’s winning time in Doha five years ago.
Having struggled to live with the early pace, Cian McPhillips came home powerfully to take fourth in a new Irish record of 1:42.15. Spain’s Mohamed Attaoui was momentarily trapped as he made his move in the home straight, and had to settle for fifth.
It will go down as one of the great 800m races with all eight men inside 1:43.
This win takes Kenya’s gold tally to six, leaving them in a clear second place in the medal table behind the United States.