Thiam Sets New World Pentathlon Record in Thrilling Victory

Nafissatou Thiam had to dig deep over the last lap of the women’s pentathlon 800m to beat Poland’s Adrianna Sułek and set a new world record as well as claiming her third European Indoor Championships gold medal at the Ataköy Arena in Istanbul. Here is all you need to know:

– Belgian Thiam came into the Championships with two European Indoor Championships golds and a silver as well as two Olympic golds, two World Championship golds and two European golds in the heptathlon.

– Thiam is still looking to beat American Jackie Joyner-Kersee’s heptathlon world record, however there was a good chance of the pentathlon world record in Türkiye based on her strength across all the events.

– On Friday morning, she opened up with 8.23s and 1077 points for a personal best in the 60m hurdles, then followed up with a season’s best of 1.92m and 1132 points in topping the high jump standings.

– The last event of the morning session saw her top the field in the shot put too with a personal best of 15.54m and 897 points to lead Sułek by 144 points heading into the final two events later in the day.

– In Friday evening’s long jump, Brussels native Thiam scored a season’s best of 6.59m for 1036 points however Sułek jumped further to cut Thiam’s lead by 10 points heading into the nail-biting 800m event finale.

– Sułek, the 2022 World Indoor Championship silver medallist, ran hard in the 800m and won with 2:07.17 to break the previous world pentathlon record only for Thiam to dig deep behind to finish in 2:13.60 which was enough to win gold and set a new world record mark of 5,055 points as compatriot Noor Vidts was ahead of the rest to earn bronze behind Sułek.

– Thiam said: “It went so good. It was my first indoor competition of the season. Training has been going really well, but I didn’t have the repetition especially in the jumps because I had a bit of a problem with my knee. To be able to do the world record and feel so good despite that is a great feeling because I know I can do so much better.”