Rhasidat Adeleke Ends Season with Bronze in Diamond League Final: Dublin Sprinter Shows Promise Despite Tough Competition

There was perhaps some gentle irony in Rhasidat Adeleke being promoted to third place in Friday night’s Diamond League final in Brussels, after Bahrain’s Salwa Eid Naser was disqualified for a lane infringement, although it was a visibly and understandably tiring end of season run over 400m by the Dublin sprinter.

Exactly five weeks after her fourth-place finish in the Olympics, and lining up against two of the medal winners from Paris, Adeleke finished in 50.96 seconds on a cool, damp evening the inside the King Baudouin Stadium in the heart of the Belgian capital, far from conducive for fast running.

Marileidy Paulino of the Dominican Republic proved her dominance once again, winning in 49.45 seconds (taking the top prize of $30,000), well off the 48.25 the 27-year-old clocked to win the gold medal inside the Stade de France, though still unbeaten in the event this year.

“Of course I would have loved to run faster and closer to my personal best, but it was really, really cold tonight,” said Paulino. “A decent race at the end of a very long season.”

Starting in lane four, with Paulino in five, Naser in six, the 22-year-old Adeleke went out a little more cautiously that her last Diamond League run in Poland two weeks after Paris, though was still in contention for a top three place coming into the homestretch, alongside Naser, who won silver in Paris.

Then Alexis Holmes from the US came darting through in lane three to nail second in 50.32, Adeleke originally ending up fourth, Naser holding on for third in 50.64, before her disqualification. Adeleke pocketed $7,000 for third.

Naser won the Olympic silver in Paris in 48.53, her fastest time since returning from a two-year doping ban in 2021, and she’s still competing despite the Athletics Integrity Unit (AIU) imposing a 12-month ban on the Bahrain Athletics Association (BAA) for “serious anti-doping rule violations” and “historical breaches of the World Athletics anti-doping rules” just eight months before the Paris Olympics.

Naser, along with all Bahrain athletes, were also disqualified from all World Athletics Series events for a year, although these don’t include the Diamond League.

Holmes was contesting her first Diamond event and finished sixth in the Olympic final in Paris, the 24-year-old running a personal best of 49.77, before winning gold with the 4x400m relay.

Still Adeleke’s long season clearly left her well running a little dry, having started her outdoor season over five months ago. One notable absentee was Natalia Kaczmarek from Poland, who edged Adeleke out of the Olympic bronze medal and had already called closing time on her season.

Interestingly, Sydney McLaughlin-Levrone, the Olympic champion and world record holder in the 400m hurdles from the US, who had hoped to attempt a 200m-400m double this weekend, had to settle for the invitational race, which she won in a faster time of 49.10 seconds, well over a second ahead of Stacey Ann Williams from Jamaica, who took second there in 50.33.

Reflecting on a Busy Season

Brussels was the climax of a particularly long summer that included the European Championships in Rome, where Adeleke won silver: she’d since returned to her base in Texas for one last training block under coach Edrick Floreal – and celebrated her 22nd birthday on August 29th – and can take plenty of encouragement from the brilliant progress she has made this season, including Irish records over 60m, 200m and 300m indoors, and 100m and 400m outdoors, a European gold medal with a mixed relay in Rome, and silver in the women’s 4x400m.

Adeleke's Road to Brussels

Adeleke duly qualified for Friday’s 400m final by virtue of several Diamond League appearances over the summer, including a victory in Monaco back on July 12th, where she ran 49.17 seconds – although she hasn’t run faster since.

Adeleke’s training partner Julien Alfed from St Lucia, who won Olympic gold in the 100m, showed little sign of tiredness here as she won in 10.88, and Jakob Ingebrigtsen from Norway also won the 1,500m in 3:30.37, Cole Hocker from the US, who won gold in Paris, third in 3:30.94.

The End of a Season

The Olympics has always been the ultimate grand finale of the athletics season. And after all the effort to qualify and then turn up in the best shape possible, it can all seem a little anti-climactic and underwhelming in the weeks and months afterwards.

It’s been close to five weeks since the closing ceremony in Paris and that difficult task of trying to stay motivated physically and (more likely) mentally has meant that some athletes have already walked away happy with their lot.

The meetings that take place after any big championship, particularly after the Olympics, can be a mixed bag. Some athletes are still out for redemption if their Olympic medal hopes didn’t quite play out as they wished, and that can also be a source of some financial consolation.

A Challenging End

Rhasidat Adeleke will be trying one more time to crash into the top three in the 400m, her chances improved this time given the absence of Natalia Kaczmarek.

This weekend the season culminates with the Diamond League final in Brussels, a venue where some athletes have finished their season on a high. Most notably for Ireland, this is where Ciara Mageean broke the Irish 1,500m record the last two years in a row, running her 3:55.87 this time last year.

Sadly, Mageean’s season ended before she even got to race in the Olympics, an Achilles tendon injury forcing her to withdraw on the eve of the 1,500m heats in Paris. So this year there will be just one Irish athlete competing and, unsurprisingly, it’s our current best athlete Rhasidat Adeleke.

Adeleke will be trying one more time to crash into the top three in the 400m, her chances improved this time given the absence of Natalia Kaczmarek, who has already stepped away after finishing up her season at home in Poland, where she was celebrated after winning the bronze medal in Paris just ahead of Adeleke.

It is a bit more difficult to step away when you don’t quite achieve the targets you set for yourself. That’s probably the one thing that is keeping Adeleke focussed as there is still a chance for her to get ahead of one or both of her other main rivals, hoping they’ve been enjoying the celebrations, and maybe a slight edge taken off their focus as the season shuts down.

It would also be a huge boost to her confidence and motivation going into the winter if she could beat either the Olympic champion Marileidy Paulino from the Dominican Republic or silver medallist Salwa Eid Naser from Bahrain.

Looking Ahead to Future Championships

One possible drawback for Adeleke is that she has returned to her training base in Texas twice since Paris, and the ripple effect of recovering and resetting from each transatlantic flight can wear down an athlete.

However, the whole 400m field in Brussels could be upstaged just 10 minutes earlier, when Sydney McLaughlin-Levrone from the US takes on an invitational race set up especially for her as she did not qualify for the final due to not racing a single Diamond League event this year. McLaughlin-Levrone has said her target is to set a personal best, which if it transpires could be the fastest time run in the world this year.

This may be something that Adeleke might need to consider looking ahead to future World and Olympic championships. No matter how you travel, you have to respect what crossing time zones does to your body.

Ending the Season

There has been talk of the athletics season ending in future years at the main championship event. That’s an easy decision in 2025, with the World Championships in Tokyo not taking place until September 13th -21st.

For the 2028 Olympics in Los Angeles, the dates are already set for mid-July, so it’s hard to imagine the whole Diamond League season finishing up by then, and also squeezing in the Continental Tour Gold, Silver and Bronze meetings, along with the small challenger meetings that are a big attraction in many small towns throughout Europe.

These typically take place in August and September when the athletes are more relaxed and can enjoy the local surroundings as well as putting on a show for the local fans. And it would be detrimental to the sport to have them wiped out by a shortened season, or on top of the new grand slam events in the US due to be introduced in 2025 by Michael Johnson.

The Future of Athletics

Even though the Diamond League final is the culmination of the season, there is one remaining invitational event taking place in New York City on September 26th, where some of the best women athletes have been invited to race for the biggest prize money ever on offer.

Many believe it is high time to raise the bar and increase the prize money on offer. After all, some athletes are being paid quite a bit less to win their event in 2024 than they were back in 2000.

Known as the Athlos meeting, and started up by Alexis Ohanian, husband of Serena Williams, there are just six track events scheduled where the first prize in every race is $60,000 (€54,000).

They will also have a larger than normal travel budget, allowing all athletes to travel business class. It’s like a crock of gold bonus pot at the end of a very long season, even if the results will mean very little apart from the elevation of the appreciation of women in sport, in the first-of-its-kind women-only track meeting.

In contrast, the winner’s pay cheque for the Diamond League Final is $30,000, even though the level and status of the competition is a lot greater and in front of a sellout crowd at the King Baudouin Stadium.

There’s lots I’m still looking forward to, such as Olympic 200m champion Letsile Tebogo continuing his dominant form over his American rivals, Mondo Duplantis going for his 11th world record in the pole vault, or Jakob Ingebrigtsen trying one more time this season to come out on top over 1,500m.

Many believe it is high time to raise the bar and increase the prize money on offer. After all, some athletes are being paid quite a bit less to win their event in 2024 than they were back in 2000, and that’s hardly progress.

Rhasidat Adeleke's Final Push

Exactly five weeks after her Olympic fourth place finish Rhasidat Adeleke will once more go to the 400m well in Friday’s Diamond League final in Brussels. Given she opened her outdoor season more than five months ago it’s understandable if things are starting to run a little dry.

The climax of a particularly long summer that included the European Championships in Rome and the Olympics in Paris, the Brussels Memorial Van Damme event is also the culmination of the 14 Diamond League meetings and spread over two nights inside the King Baudouin Stadium in the heart of the Belgian capital.

Adeleke duly qualified for a place in Friday’s 400m final (7.04pm Irish time) by virtue of several Diamond League appearances over the summer, including a victory in Monaco back on July 12th, where the Dublin sprinter ran 49.17 seconds. She hasn’t run faster since.

The Brussels line-up includes five of the eight finalists from that Olympic final in the Stade de France back on August 9th, including Marileidy Paulino of the Dominican Republic and Bahrain’s Salwa Eid Naser, who won gold and silver respectively.

The notable absentee is Natalia Kaczmarek from Poland, who edged Adeleke out of the Olympic bronze medal, and has called time on her similarly long season, which also saw her win the European title in Rome, where Adeleke won silver in her national record of 49.07.

All three medal Olympic winners also went to the line at the Silesia Diamond League meeting in Poland two weeks after Paris, finishing in the same podium order, with Adeleke again finishing fourth in 50 seconds flat.

She’s since returned to her base in Texas for one last training block under coach Edrick Floréal before Brussels – and celebrated her 22nd birthday on August 29th – and has spoken about her intention to get one more valuable run before her season is done.

“Experience is a huge factor in being a good 400m runner,” she said, “because you’ll need to know how to run, which style, where you’re positioned, your competition, and they are some of the things we are trying to figure out.

“I guess that’s something all the girls who’re competing at their best now have done, when they were up and coming athletes. So we’re in that phase now and I feel like this is my second year training for the 400m, so I definitely do need that experience going forward.”

In Silesia, Adeleke went out significantly faster, tearing around the opening 100m in 11.80 seconds in lane seven to take a lead on Paulino and Naser, before they reeled her in down the homestretch, with Kaczmarek passing her just before the line.

Paulino is unbeaten in her nine 400m races this year, winning gold in Paris in 48.17, and with that the 27-year-old took down the 48.25 Olympic record set by the Marie-José Pérec back in 1996.

Naser won silver in 48.53, her fastest time since returning from a two-year doping ban in 2021, and she’s still competing despite the Athletics Integrity Unit (AIU) imposing a 12-month ban on the Bahrain Athletics Association (BAA) for “serious anti-doping rule violations” and “historical breaches of the World Athletics anti-doping rules” just eight months before the Paris Olympics.

Luckily for Naser, the Diamond League is not part of the World Athletics Series events, and while Adeleke can certainly challenge for a podium place in Brussels (the top prize in each event is $30,000), Paulino and Naser will probably have a little more in reserve to take the two top spots. Adeleke has been racing outdoors since being part of the University of Texas quartet that set a new world best in the 4x200m back on March 30th.

McLaughlin-Levrone's Return

One athlete Adeleke won’t have to worry about in Brussels is Sydney McLaughlin-Levrone, the Olympic champion and world record holder in the 400m hurdles from the US, who had hoped to attempt a 200m-400m double this weekend.

Turns out McLaughlin-Levrone wasn’t eligible for any wild card entry, given she had not raced any Diamond league meetings this year, so will instead contest two separate invitational races, against lessor opposition for sure, although after she ran 50.37 to win 400m hurdles gold in Paris, her time over 400m flat is eagerly anticipated.

[ Jakob Ingebrigtsen is the latest thrilling exponent of the ‘race hard, race often’ approachOpens in new window ]

The Brussels event, now in its 48th year, in all features 82 medal winners from Paris, including gold medal winners Letsile Tebogo (200m), Jakob Ingebrigtsen (5,000m) and Adeleke’s training partner Julien Alfred (100m).

The Final Curtain

ONCE MORE UNTO the breach for Rhasidat Adeleke, who will end her outdoor season tonight by renewing acquaintances with many of her Olympic rivals.

Adeleke runs in the 400m at the Diamond League final in Brussels tonight [Live Virgin Media 2; 7.04pm Irish time] where she will once again share a call room with Marileidy Paulino and Salwa Eid Naser, the respective gold and silver medalists from the final in Paris.

Bronze medalist Natalia Kaczmarek, however, won’t be lining up, having decided to end her season at the start of September.

Adeleke’s rivalry with Kaczmarek stretches back to the European Championship at the start of the summer, when the Polish athlete pipped Adeleke to the gold medal in Rome.

Other recognisable names in the final include Lieke Klaver of the Netherlands, Alexis Holmes of USA, and Sada Williams of Barbados.

It’s not Adeleke’s first competitive outing since the Olympic final: she ran at the Diamond League event in Silesia, where she again finished fourth behind Paulino, Eid Naser, and Kaczmarek.

Athletes qualified for their respective Diamond League finals by accruing points across 14 regular season events. Adeleke’s best result was victory at Monaco in July, clocking 49:17. To her own disappointment, she didn’t lower that time at the Olympic Games.

Also not in the 400m field today is the Olympic champion and world record holder over hurdles, Sydney McLaughlin-Levrone.

The American was initially announced as racing the 200m and 400m flat in Brussels as a wildcard, which led to a backlash that pointed out she was not actually eligible for a wildcard under the competition’s own rules, as she had not competed at a Diamond League meet at all across 2024.

Hence the organisers have pulled her from Adeleke’s final, but she will race in an exhibition 400m event to be run immediately prior to the official event. Such is her star power, American broadcaster NBC have adjusted their broadcast window to ensure her race is shown.

This is partly because it’s relatively rare to see McLaughlin-Levrone race at all: the Olympics were just her fifth event of the year. Though McLaughlin-Levrone has prioritised hurdles, she ran the 400m flat in July of last year, clocking 48.74, the second-fastest time in American history and the 12th-fastest global time ever.

Adeleke is the only Irish athlete involved across two days’ action in Brussels, where highlights will include Armand Duplantis’ latest world record attempt in the pole vault, while shock Olympic champion Cole Hocker will again meet Jakob Ingebrigtsen in the men’s 1500m final.

Each winner receives $30,000 and a guaranteed wild card entry to next year’s world championship in Tokyo.

On TV: Friday and Saturday from 7pm; Virgin Media Two

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It wasn’t how she wanted to finish, a sense of déjà vu kicking in down the home straight as Rhasidat Adeleke struggled to keep pace with the world’s best, but in the end this was a solid way to close out another breakthrough season.

At the Diamond League final in Brussels on Friday night, the 22-year-old Dubliner clocked 50.96 to come home third in the 400m behind Olympic champion Marileidy Paulino (49.45) and USA’s Alexis Holmes (50.32).

Adeleke crossed the line fourth, but Olympic silver medallist Salwa Eid Naser of Bahrain, who’d finished third in 50.64, was disqualified for a lane infringement, upgrading Adeleke to third and netting her $7,000 (€6,300) in prize money.

On a cold night in the Belgian capital, fast times were never going to be on the table and Adeleke employed a strategy similar to the Olympic final. Despite having the best speed in the race, she got off to a conservative start and was just fifth through the opening 100m, covered in 12.22, and she then moved up to third by 200m, reached in 23.78.

She was still third at 300m, just inches behind Naser, but couldn’t match the leaders down the home straight and her last 50 metres showed undeniable signs of a long, exhausting season.

While it was a performance – and a time – that she won’t be pleased with, a third-place finish in her debut at the Diamond League final caps another huge year for Adeleke, who looks well on track to claim individual medals at global level in the years ahead.

She smashed Irish records over 60m, 200m and 300m indoors and over 100m and 400m outdoors. In May, she helped Ireland to bronze medals in the mixed 4x400m at the World Relays and won silver in both the 400m and women’s 4x400m at the Europeans in June, along with gold in the mixed 4x400m.

She was just 0.3 away from an individual medal at the Olympics, her frustration about that only heightened following another fourth-place finish in the women’s 4x400m, where she teamed up with Sophie Becker, Phil Healy and Sharlene Mawdsley to obliterate the Irish record, their time of 3:19.90 just 0.18 away from the medals.

A Strong Finish to a Busy Season

Elsewhere in Brussels, Jakob Ingebrigtsen returned to winning ways in the 1500m, turning in a commanding performance to kick clear and take victory in 3:30.37.

Olympic champion Julien Alfred and Dina Asher-Smith – who both train with Adeleke in Texas – went 1-2 in women’s 100m, clocking 10.88 and 10.92, with world champion Sha’Carri Richardson well off the pace, finishing eighth in 11.23.

Mondo Duplantis remained a class apart in the men’s pole vault, soaring over a meeting record of 6.11m, while in the men’s 400m Britain’s Charlie Dobson sprang a surprise from an outer lane and swept to victory in 44.49.