Sixth and a PB for English at World Athletics Ultimate Championships
Letterkenny’s Mark English ran faster than he ever ran before in a top-class field to come sixth in the 800m final in a personal best time of 1:42.78 at the World Athletics Ultimate Championship at Gyula Zsivotzky National Athletics Centre in Budapest
Mark English ran a personal best to secure a sixth-place finish in the men’s 800m final at the inaugural World Athletics Ultimate Championships in Budapest.
In a lightning-fast race, Algeria’s Djamel Sedjati took gold in 1:42.28, Canada’s Marco Arop was second with 1:42.28 and Olympic champion Emmanuel Wanyonyi of Kenya came in third with 1:42.44
English was seventh at the bell, with Arop leading the field in 49.69 seconds and the Donegal man would manage to come sixth in 1:42.78, beating his own PB of 1:42.97, which he managed to get in July.
Fourth went to American Brandon Miller in 1:42.64, with Italy’s Francesco Pernici fifth with a PB 1:42.67, France’s Yanis Meziane was seventh with a PB in 1:42.78 and Belgium’s Eliott Crestan, who got 1:43.14, was eighth.
The Ultimate Championship brought together Olympic champions, world champions, Wanda Diamond League winners and the year’s best-performing athletes across 28 disciplines during three action-packed evenings of competition in the Hungarian capital.
Finn Valley AC member English became the first man to win a gold medal for Ireland at the European Athletics Championships after winning the 800m in Birmingham last month. Having sat out last week’s Diamond League final in Brussels, the Letterkenny native continued his fantastic form.
English has won six European medals in total: outdoor bronze in 2014 and 2022, indoor silver in 2015, indoor bronze in 2019 and 2025, and his historic outdoor gold in 2026.
With the top four from each of Saturday’s semi-finals making it through in Hungary, the 33-year-old ran a comfortable race, sitting in before pressing ahead in the last 150 metres to win.
English clocked 1:43.74, which was the fastest of all semi-finals, ahead of Pernici on 1:43.80. Arop - who won silver at the last Olympics - was third in 1:44.21 and eventual champion Sedjati, who was a bronze-medal winner at the 2024 Olympics in Paris, was fourth in 1:44.23.
Miller won the first semi-final in 1:43.86, ahead of Meziane in 1:44.07. Crestan from Belgium was third in 1:44.09 and Wanyonyi was fourth with 1:44.43.