World Athletics Championships: Dalilah Muhammad breaks world record to take 400m hurdles gold

The battle between the two US superstars looks set to dominate the event for years
AFP via Getty Images

Dalilah Muhammad broke the 400m hurdles world record for the second time this season to take gold at the World Athletics Championships in Doha.

The Olympic champion ran 52.16, bettering the mark of 52.20 that she set at the US Trials earlier this year, to beat American rival Sydney McLaughlin, who smashed her own PB in taking silver in 52.23, just 0.03 outside the old world record.

Jamaica’s Rushell Clayton took a distant bronze in a new personal best of 53.74, while Switzerland’s Lea Sprunger broke her own national record in fourth, but the story was all about the two Americans, who have been going at it all season.

Muhammad’s victory at the US Trials had come as something of a surprise, with McLaughlin reversing the form in the Diamond League final in the build-up to Doha.

World Athletics Championships: Day eight

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Both women had cruised through their heats, setting up another highly-anticipated hurdles match-up, after Karsten Warholm had edged out Rai Benjamin in the men’s equivalent.

Muhammad got out best, but McLaughlin was expected to come hard, and had she not checked into her eighth barrier turning for home it may have been her claiming gold and the fastest time in history.

Instead, she had to settle for silver, and the knowledge that it has taken the fastest run in history to inflict her only two defeats in the event this season, as Muhammad finally claimed gold, after finishing second at the 2013 and 2017 worlds.

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