Kenya's David Rudisha broke one of athletics' most vaunted world records today in Berlin, clocking 1:41.09 for 800m. Rudisha's performance bettered by 2/100ths of a second Denmark's Wilson Kipketer's previous standard of 1:41.11 set in Köln in 1997.
Rudisha, 21, already had the world's fastest time this year going into today's ISTAF Meeting, part of the IAAF World Athletics Challenge series: 1:41.51 set in Heusden on 10 July. That mark was also the African record. He is now undefeated in 13 800m races this year, including the African Championships where he ran 1:42.84 at high altitude in Nairobi to get the gold medal.
Today in Berlin pacemaker Sammy Tangui of Kenya took Rudisha through 400m in a blistering 48.65, and Rudisha carried the momentum through 600m alone in 1:14.54. He covered the final 200m in 26.55 seconds to get the record.
Rudisha, who represents adidas, now owns two of the top-4 times in history (four out of the top-10). He is represented by Australian manager James Templeton.
Behind Rudisha, Boaz Lalang, the 2010 IAAF World Indoor Championships silver medalist, finished second in 1:44.34. Abraham Kiplagat was third in 1:44.49.
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