Nigeria’s Tobi Amusan is expected to arrive Monaco on Sunday December 4, 2022 ahead of this year’s World Athletics Awards.
World Athletics has confirmed the invitation of the 25 year old Nigerian among the 10 athletes (five men and five women) in contention for the athlete of the year award for each gender category as well as the men and women’s rising star winners.
There will be a media day with all the athletes in attendance before the awards are presented on Monday December 5 while a winners’ breakfast with the media also in attendance has been planned for the morning of Tuesday, December 6.
Amusan has been shortlisted as one of the five finalists for the women’s athlete of the year award after making history in Oregon, USA as the first Nigerian athlete to win a world outdoor title and the first to set a world outdoor record.
The petite, reigning Nigeria, Africa and Commonwealth Games 100m hurdles champion and record holder also successfully defended her Diamond League title in Zurich to stay in contention for the award.
Amusan will battle two fellow world record breakers in 2022, USA’s Sydney McLaughlin who broke the 400m hurdles record twice and Venezuela’s Yulimar Rojas who also set a new world record in the triple jump.
Like Amusan, the duo also emerged world champions in their respective event while Rojas added the Diamond League title and the World Indoor title to her collections for the year.
Others in the five woman shortlist are Shelly-Ann Fraser-Pryce of Jamaica who achieved an unprecedented feat of running seven sub-10.70 100m races in 2022 and Peru’s Kimberly Garcia, World 20km race walk champion and winner of Peru’s first ever World Athletics Championships medal.
