2024 Diamond League Final Preview: One Final 1500 Clash, & Could the WR Go Down in the Men’s 800?

The Diamond League final is upon us, which means the 2024 professional track & field season is drawing to a close (although the new Athlos women’s only meet in NYC is on September 26). The two-day affair at the Allianz Memorial Van Damme in Brussels on Friday and Saturday will be the last chance to see many of the sport’s biggest stars like Sydney McLaughlin-Levrone, Cole Hocker, Sha’Carri Richardson, and Letsile Tebogo. The men’s 1500 between Hocker, Jakob Ingebrigtsen, and Yared Nuguse should be terrific as usual, the women’s 100 offers a battle between world champ Richardson and Olympic champ Julien Alfred, and 800 men Emmanuel Wanyonyi, Marco Arop, and Djamel Sedjati will get one last crack at David Rudisha‘s 1:40.91 world record.

It is also notable who won’t be in Brussels. Olympic 110 hurdles champion Grant Holloway, who has competed five times since winning gold in Paris, essentially said that Brussels is not paying him enough to show up, referring to it as a “trash ass track meet.” And while McLaughlin-Levrone will be in Brussels, she won’t be running any Diamond League events after the DL held firm to its policy that anyone receiving a global wild card must have competed in at least one DL event during the season (SML did not run any).

Not the smoothest end to the season, but track & field is never dull. Below, a few thoughts about the lineups in Brussels and a preview of the most entertaining races of the meet.

One last thing: this will be the last Diamond League meet broadcast on Peacock. Remember, FloTrack takes over the US streaming rights in 2025.

*Schedule, entries, & results *TV/streaming information

To run or not to run, that is the question

The Diamond League final is, theoretically, meant to be one of the biggest track meets of the season: the Diamond League is the pro league in track & field, and the DL final is its marquee event. And of the 18 athletes who won gold on the track in Paris (not counting the 10,000 since it’s not a DL event), 11 will be competing in Brussels. That certainly more than what you get in a normal Diamond League but far less than 100%.

By comparison, Rome had three Olympic champions on the track (out of eight events) and Zurich had six (out of nine events).

Here’s the breakdown of who is in and who is out in Brussels:

Taking a closer look at some of these athletes reveals some of the issues with professional track in 2024.

Athletes who shut it down after the Olympics

Noah Lyles, Rai Benjamin, Quincy Hall, Keely Hodgkinson

Hall and Hodgkinson are in a slightly different position than Lyles and Benjamin in that both athletes have dealt with some sort of injury; Hall did not run the 4×400 in Paris, while Hodgkinson planned on taking a crack at 1:53 in Brussels but decided to shut her season down due to a “small” injury.

Lyles (who got COVID-19 in Paris) and Benjamin are healthy, as far as we know, but lack the incentive to keep going this season after pouring everything into their Olympic efforts.

“I don’t think people understand the level of mental commitment and gymnastics that you’ve gotta be at throughout the entire [Olympics],” Benjamin said on the Nightcap podcast. “…Imagine playing at the Super Bowl for an entire week. That’s literally what it was.”

You can argue this one both ways. Lyles has led the charge for track & field to become more professional. He does a ton of media and consistently tries to promote the sport any way he can, more so than any other current athlete. But part of professionalizing track is ensuring the sport does not disappear outside of the Olympics. And in that respect, it does not help when the Olympic 100m champ decides to skip the final third of the Diamond League season, including the final.

On the other hand, Lyles and Benjamin just achieved the highest of all highs in our sport by winning Olympic gold. These are human beings we are talking about. You can understand why, after dedicating years of their life to that quest, they might not have the motivation to keep going for another five weeks to get to Brussels. Patrick Mahomes does not spend the month after the Super Bowl playing exhibition games.

To Seb Coe‘s credit, World Athletics recognizes this is an issue and have taken steps to remedy it. Starting next year, all odd-numbered years will end with the World Championships and all even-numbered years will end with the World Athletics Ultimate Championship, whose record $150,000 first-place prize should provide the motivation for stars to keep competing after the Olympics.

Athletes skipping the DL final to run at ATHLOS

Gabby Thomas, Masai Russell

Olympic 200 champ Gabby Thomas and Olympic 100 hurdles champ Masai Russell are both qualified for the Diamond League final, but neither is running. Yet both are signed up to run the new ATHLOS meet being held by Alexis Ohanian in New York on September 26.

Thomas has not competed since Paris so it’s hardly surprising she won’t be in Brussels — she has been on a media tour/victory lap in the US capitalizing on her newfound fame. Russell, meanwhile, has raced four times since the Olympics. But her agent Paul Doyle told LetsRun that Russell is tired after all of the racing and preferred to get in some rest and training before ATHLOS rather than tacking on another race in Brussels.

By skipping Brussels, Russell will miss out on one of the biggest prize purses in the sport. But ATHLOS is even bigger, and if Russell wins there, she would take home $60,000 — twice what she would win in the DL final.

Grant Holloway

The Olympic 110 hurdles champ gets his own category. Holloway candidly announced that Brussels did not meet his asking price when it came to an appearance fee:

I will not be participating in the Brussels Diamond League Final due to a failure to reach agreements on the terms of my participation between my team and the meeting directors of the Diamond League. Shame that they doing athletes like that.. #BrusselsDL #NeverCompeteForLess

— S. Grant Holloway, OLY (@Flaamingoo_) September 10, 2024

It’s rare for athletes to discuss this sort of stuff in public, but Holloway and his team feel he has been disrespected in this instance. Holloway’s agent John Regis told LetsRun.com that Brussels’ appearance fee was “not close” to what other Diamond Leagues had offered him this season. The flip side to that is that Brussels’ prize money is also significantly higher — $30,000 for first compared to $10,000 at a regular Diamond League.

“All the Diamond League meets have paid exactly the same and if they were in the same ballpark, that’s fine,” Regis told LetsRun.com. “But when you’re not even close, to me, that’s disrespecting the athlete. Because our sport is all about performance at the highest level, and Grant is the GOAT. He’s won every major championship. The most sub-13 performances of any athlete that’s ever lived. He’s got the world indoor record, .01 from the world outdoor record.”

On to the meet…

Men’s 1500: Ingebrigtsen, Nuguse, and Hocker “go at it for real”

A week before racing in last week’s Diamond League 1500 in Zurich, Jakob Ingebrigtsen let the running world know he had been sick and did not expect to be at 100%. And within hours of finishing 2nd behind Yared Nuguse, 3:29.21 to 3:29.52, Ingebrigtsen doubled down, posting on Instagram: “Competing with a cold: probably not the best medicine. 🤔 Not showing up: not an option, unless half dead. Not my day, but first and foremost: a great performance by Nuguse.”

If you were looking for verbal sparring after the fact, it did not materialize. Nuguse opted for the high road, politely responding to Ingebrigtsen’s post with: “Looking forward to go at it for real in Brussels 🙌🏾”

So here we are in Brussels, ready for the “real” thing.

We began 2024 with a “Big Two” in the men’s 1500 of Ingebrigtsen and Josh Kerr, but the success of Nuguse and Cole Hocker at the Olympics and beyond have turned it into a “Big Four.” And so far, the results have been split incredibly evenly between them. Each man has beaten all of the others at least once this year:

The “Big Four” 1500 men in 2024

Brussels won’t settle anything — Hocker won the race that truly mattered this year — but it’s always fun to see these guys turn up and race against each other. Kerr won’t be in Brussels, but the other three will be. Ingebrigtsen, the most consistent of the trio, should be favored; when he lost at Pre, it was his first race after a lengthy injury layoff, and when he lost in Zurich, he certainly appeared to be feeling the effects of his recent illness. But we know how good Hocker and Nuguse can be when they get it right, and last year’s DL final showed that even when Ingebrigtsen is at his best, Nuguse can give him a run in a rabbitted race.

There’s also the question of the world record. Ingebrigtsen ran 3:26.73 in Monaco in July and a monster WR of 7:17 for 3000 on August 25 in Silesia. The latter performance is worth 3:24.82 on the World Athletics scoring tables, but that is a bit misleading as Ingebrigtsen is better-suited to the 3000 than the 1500. If he’s fully recovered from illness and we get the Silesia version of Ingebrigtsen in Brussels, many are wondering if Hicham El Guerrouj‘s 3:26.00 WR would be in danger: MB: Will 3:26.00 fall this Friday in Brussels?

That appears to not be the case. LetsRun.com has been told that as of now, the wavelights in Brussels will only be targeting 3:30 — though that is subject to change. Perhaps Ingebrigtsen wants to see how his kick stacks up in a slower race or perhaps he wants to save some energy — it is rumored he will make his half marathon debut in Copenhagen on Sunday in what would be a monster race against world record holder Jacob Kiplimo and reigning World Half Marathon champion Sabastian Sawe.

Ingebrigtsen was asked about the half marathon in the pre-meet press conference and would neither confirm nor deny that he was racing in Copenhagen.

“I’m going to compete tomorrow [in the 1500] first, and then what I do after that, I don’t know,” Ingebrigtsen said.

MB: Will 3:26.00 fall this Friday in Brussels?
MB: Rumour in Norway that Jakob will run Copenhagen Half on Sunday.

Men’s 800: One last crack at the world record

The winning times of the last five major men’s 800-meter races (four Diamond Leagues and the Olympics): 1:41.56, 1:41.46, 1:41.19, 1:41.11, 1:41.86.

David Rudisha‘s 800-meter world record: 1:40.91.

The men’s 800 has enjoyed one of its greatest seasons ever, with a plethora of fast times and exciting finishes. Can we cap off the year with someone breaking one of the most iconic world records track & field has ever seen? Between Olympic champ Emmanuel Wanyonyi (1:41.11 pb), Olympic silver medalist Marco Arop (1:41.20 pb), and Olympic bronze medalist Djamel Sedjati (1:41.56 pb), we have three men with a legitimate shot at breaking Rudisha’s record on Saturday.

Typically this year, either Wanyonyi or Arop has been the one leading the way through 400. Expect one of them to go to the front early and for Sedjati to strike late on the home stretch.

It’s also worth watching the clock at 400. In the last five world records — three by Rudisha, two by Wilson Kipketer — the first lap split has ranged between 48.3 and 49.3 with the second lap between 51.6 and 52.9. The fastest men this year have been running much closer to even splits. In the five fastest times of 2024 — two by Wanyonyi, one by Arop, two by Sedjati, all 1:41.50 or faster — the first lap splits have ranged between 50.0 and 51.1 with the second laps between 50.1 and 51.3 (two of these races were actually negative splits). The temptation is to rip the first lap super fast in a world record attempt, but based on what they have shown this year, these guys may be better served trying to keep the first lap right around 50 seconds and just trying to close a little faster.

There are a few things working against them. We are now more than a month after the Olympics — are all of these guys still in peak shape? Last year, all three ran their fastest times in the DL final, so it’s possible the answer is yes. Regarding Sedjati, specifically, this is the first time he will race since the Olympics, where he allegedly had his room in the Olympic village raided as part of a doping investigation (he has not been charged with any violation). Algerian media reported he was dealing with a calf injury in Paris (though he ran 1:41.50 at the Olympics); is he ready to go in Brussels?

Women’s 200 and 400: Sydney McLaughlin-Levrone chases personal bests

In an ideal world, Sydney McLaughlin-Levrone running the 400 at the Diamond League final would mean a showdown against Olympic champion Marileidy Paulino of the Dominican Republic (48.17 pb). Instead, we’ll get SML running against a watered-down field at 1:53 p.m. ET on Friday, followed by Paulino racing in the actual Diamond League 400 final 10 minutes later. It’s a farcical scenario: the woman who never races Diamond Leagues finally wants to race one, but because she did not race any during the regular season, she’s not eligible to compete in the final in Brussels. The DL chose to enforce its rules rather than make an exception, which actually makes sense given the fact she’s going to the be face of a rival league next year.

I’ll still be watching to see how fast SML runs (fortunately, NBC has told LetsRun.com the Peacock broadcast will start early so American viewers can watch her race). She told the press on Tuesday that she would like to improve on her personal best of 48.74 set last year. She was definitely in shape to do so earlier this year — she ran 48.75 on a windy day in New York in June — and any personal best would give her a great shot at Sanya Richards-Ross‘s American record of 48.70, which has stood since 2006.

SML has not raced since Paris and told the press she still feels mentally and physically fresh following the Olympics. I’m predicting the American record goes down on Friday.

It’s the same story on Saturday as McLaughlin-Levrone is entered in the B heat of the 200 just before the actual DL 200 final featuring Sha’Carri Richardson. Two of the biggest track stars in the world running the same distance on the same track, 20 minutes apart. What a shame that they will not be racing each other.

One quick thought about every other DL track final

There are 18 Diamond League track finals, which is way too many to preview comprehensively in a single article. World Athletics’ day 1 preview is here and their day 2 preview is here. We already hit the men’s 800, men’s 1500, and women’s 200/400. Here is one thing I’ll be looking for in the other 14 races:

Men’s 100: Can Christian Coleman end his year on a high and repeat as DL champion after switching coaches from Tim Hall to Dennis Mitchell after the Olympics?

Men’s 200: Letsile Tebogo ran 19.55 in Zurich last week and said afterwards he did not even run the turn properly. “That is something I will do at the Diamond League final because there is still more inside me,” Tebogo said. How much faster does he go in Brussels?

Men’s 400: Matt Hudson-Smith, 29, had never broken 44 in his life until July 20 in London. Since then, he’s run sub-44 in all three of his 400m finals. Does the Olympic silver medalist have another one in him in Brussels?

Men’s 5,000: With Olympic champ Jakob Ingebrigtsen running the 1500 only, Hagos Gebrhiwet (winner in Oslo and Rome) is the favorite here against a field that includes Yomif Kejelcha and Olympic silver medalist Ronald Kwemoi.

Men’s 110 hurdles: Frenchman Sasha Zhoya just missed the Olympic final on home soil, but he’s been on a roll recently, winning in Rome, setting a 13.10 pb in Zurich, and defeating Grant Holloway for the first time in Bellinzona. With no Holloway in Brussels, can the 22-year-old cap his year with a Diamond League title?

Men’s 400 hurdles: With no Rai Benjamin and an injured Karsten Warholm, Alison dos Santos is the only one of the Big Three in Brussels. And even dos Santos pulled up in his last DL in Zurich, leaving a wide-open race for the DL title.

Men’s steeple: Soufiane El Bakkali has not lost a steeple since the 2021 DL final in Zurich. I don’t expect that streak to end on Friday.

Women’s 100: Sha’Carri Richardson v Julien Alfred is one of the marquee races of the meet. Richardson has won both of their DL matchups this year, in Eugene and Zurich, but Alfred won the race that mattered most in Paris.

Women’s 800: Mary Moraa has been the woman to beat in this event when Keely Hodgkinson and Athing Mu are not around, and she’ll be the clear favorite here with Olympic silver medalist Tsige Duguma absent.

Women’s 1500: Faith Kipyegon has not lost a 1500 since Sifan Hassan beat her at the Florence Diamond League in June 2021.

Women’s 5,000: Beatrice Chebet took a shot at the 14:00 world record last week in Zurich and came up short (though she still ran a world-leading 14:09). Chebet said afterwards she did not plan on taking another crack at the WR last year. Expect a dominant Chebet victory, but not a crazy-fast time.

Women’s 100 hurdles: Jasmine Camacho-Quinn and Ackera Nugent have each won two Diamond Leagues since the Olympics. Expect one of them to make it three in Brussels.

Women’s 400 hurdles: With SML in the 200 and 400, Femke Bol is the heavy favorite in the final race of the meet.

Women’s steeple: 2024 Olympic champ Winfred Yavi came an agonizing .07 shy of the 8:44.32 world record in Rome two weeks ago, thanks in part to 2021 Olympic champ Peruth Chemutai pushing the pace early. We could see another very fast time if the two are willing to go for it in Brussels.