Olympic 1500m champion Faith Kipyegon will face rival Sifan Hassan in the 1500m finals on Thursday, September 9, in the 2021 Diamond League in Zurich.
Sifan, the Olympic 5000m and 10,000m winner, admitted after running in the One Mile race that was held last Friday night at the Allianz Memorial Van Damme that her body could no longer handle the 5000m or 10000m race at the moment, so she preferred the 1500m, which she can easily handle.
Kipyegon, who beat Sifan during the concluded Tokyo Olympic games, is coming to this final with a season best of 3:51.07 against Hassan’s 3:53.60.
The two stars will also be competing with other elite runners such as Uganda’s 2014 Commonwealth Games 800m bronze medalist, Winnie Nanyondo, Ethiopia’s Axumawit Embaye who is also the 2014 World Indoor 1500m silver medallist Champion, Australia’s Linden Hall and USA’s Josette.
Also, in the same event, world champion Helen Obiri will tackle Burundian Francine Niyonsaba on Wednesday, September 9, in the 5000m final.
This is after Niyonsaba made her switch in her career from running 800m to now long distance races, following the decision of World Athletics on women with elevated levels of certain hormones.
In the men’s equivalent, Bethwel Birgen, Michael Kibet, Nicholas Kimeli and Jackob Krop are among twelve runners who will close the show at Zurich’s Sechseläutenplatz arena where seven of 32 Diamond League events will conclude.