SPRINT STARS OBLIQUE Seville and Julien Alfred won their respective races on the opening day of the two-day Diamond League finals in Brussels on Friday.

But the evening’s entertainment was mired by the withdrawal of Armand ‘Mondo’ Duplantis with a tightness in his leg that had resurfaced at last week’s meet in Zurich.

“I pushed through it, probably a little bit too much. I said that if I felt this irritation during my warm-up, I wasn’t going to jump,” the US-born Swede said.

Duplantis admitted he was not certain to make the inaugural season-ending World Athletics Ultimate Championship in Budapest next week.

“I don’t have the answer right now,” he said on whether he would be fit enough to compete in Hungary where there will be a prize money pot of $10 million (€8.6 million).

To make Duplantis’s night even worse, Greek rival Emmanouil Karalis won the pole vault with a meet record of 6.12m, beating by 1cm the previous best set by the Swede in 2024.

Back on the track, world 100m champion Seville overcame a poor start to win the blue riband race in 9.90 ahead of Cameroon’s Emmanuel Eseme.

The Jamaican left it late to reel in the field, but looked comfortable as he crossed the line.

“My start was far from the best, but the aim is always to win so I won’t complain,” said Seville.

“I didn’t change too much after becoming a world champion. What I was doing clearly worked, and this season is further proof of that. Next season I want to extend my title and dominate the Diamond League.”

St Lucia’s Olympic champion Alfred made short work of the women’s 200m, winning in 21.79 ahead of American Kayla White.

In a night of six meeting records, the most impressive was arguably set by Botswana’s world champion Busang Collen Kebinatshipi, who scorched to an impressive 43.40 in the 400m.

It was the joint fifth-fastest time ever run over the one-lap race, smashing by 0.23 the previous best set in 2021 by American Michael Cherry, as the top four all posted sub-44 times.

Trinidad and Tobago’s Jereem Richards set a national record in second ahead of the US pair of Jacory Patterson and Chris Bailey, both in personal bests.

Not to be outdone, Kenya’s world and Olympic 800m champion Emmanuel Wanyonyi won his fourth consecutive Diamond League title with victory in 1:41.80, smashing by 0.40 the meet record set by Denmark’s Wilson Kipketer in 1997.

“Today was all about winning and I knew that I would have to run 1:41 to win — and I did,” said Wanyonyi.

There was a second Kenyan meeting record, this time by Faith Cherotich, who won her third Diamond League title in a row in 8:51.61.

Australian Cameron Myers came out top of a loaded 1,500m, winning in 3:30.14 as Norwegian wildcard Jakob Ingebrigtsen cracked down the home straight to end up fifth.

American Chase Jackson also set a new area, meet and Diamond League record in winning the women’s shot with 21.14m — an improvement of 12cm on her personal best.

Jackson’s teammate and world record holder Ja’Kobe Tharp, still just 20, stormed to victory in the 110m hurdles in 13.03.

Jamaica’s Tajay Gayle went out to a season’s best of 8.46m to edge Greek’s Olympic champion Miltiadis Tentoglu by 6cm in the long jump, while Slovenia’s Kristjan Ceh managed a meet record of 71.29m to outgun Mykolas Alekna in the men’s discus.

American Valarie Sion’s five-year title-winning discus streak came to an end, however, as Feng Bin managed the best of 67.46m to become the first Chinese athlete to be crowned Diamond League champion since 2019.

– © AFP 2026