David Rudisha Was The Man To Beat In 2011

He hopes to improve on his own world record next year.

It’s a known fact that until David Rudisha arrived on the scene, the men’s 800m event had been in a bit of a slump. The classic two-lap race had evolved into purely a tactical affair with runners holding back until the final sprint. Case in point: The 2007 World Championships in Osaka when the winning time was a relatively pedestrian 1:47:09–the slowest winning time at a world-championship-level race since 1956!

In fact, according to the IAAF: “from 1983-2009 the [world championship] winner [clocked] 1:43 in six (i.e. 50%!) [races], 1:44 in three, 1:45 in two – and then 1:47 in one.”

All that changed with Kenya’s David Rudisha, who set the world record in 2010 (1:41:01).

Rudisha spent the entire 2011 season, trying to improve on his own mark, but came up short–a mere 32 hundredths of a second, in fact.

The post-championship season is longer next year, so the chances are good that the record will fall in 2012. Rudisha’s supremacy is so certain, his main rival in the 800m, Abubaker Kaki, may be forced to move up to the 1500m.

For More: IAAF