Sha'Carri Richardson extends support to Mondo Duplantis for World Athlete of the Year award

ATHLETICS Sha'Carri Richardson extends support to Mondo Duplantis for World Athlete of the Year award

Abigael Wafula 13:30 - 13.10.2023

Sha'Carri Richardson has extended her support to Sweden's Mondo Duplantis to be voted for as the World Athlete of the Year.

World 100m champion Sha’Carri Richardson has vouched for Mondo Duplantis to be voted in for as the male World Athlete of the Year.

Richardson posted a photo of Duplantis on her Instagram page after the list of nominees was out, however, she did not caption it.

Duplantis, who holds both the indoor and outdoor pole vault world records, was nominated in the men’s category owing to his exploits at the World Championships that saw him defend his title.

The 23-year-old then extended his hot streak to the Prefontaine Classic, the final Diamond League Meeting where he did extremely well, setting a world record whilst winning the trophy one more time.

Richardson and Duplantis share a unique relationship since they are also former teammates. They both began studying at the Louisiana State University in 2018 where they joined as Freshmen.

They left the school as NCAA champions, with Richardson winning ‘The Bowerman’ trophy in 2019 and Duplantis a finalist for the same prestigious award the same year.

Duplantis is expected to battle it out with triple World champion Noah Lyles, newly-crowned World marathon record holder Kelvin Kiptum, and Jakob Ingebrigtsen.

Others shortlisted include Neeraj Chopra, Ryan Crouser, Soufiane El Bakkali, Pierce LePage, Alvaro Martin, Miltiadis Tentoglou, and Karsten Warholm.

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