Erriyon Knighton and Medina Eisa
As the countdown to the World Athletics Awards 2023 continues, we shine a spotlight on the three women and three men who have been nominated for this year’s Rising Star awards.
In the second of three features, we profile Ethiopia’s Medina Eisa and USA’s Erriyon Knighton.
The winners of the Rising Star awards will be selected by an international panel of experts and announced on World Athletics’ platforms on 11 December.
Medina Eisa
Ethiopian teenager Medina Eisa is part of a select group of athletes who competed at three World Athletics Series events in 2023.
Following on from her world U20 5000m triumph in 2022, Eisa started her year with a successful outing at the World Cross Country Championships in Bathurst, where she claimed the silver medal.
Two months later, she won over 5km in Herzogenaurach in 14:46, the fastest ever clocking by an U20 athlete.
From June to September, Eisa focused exclusively on the 5000m. She opened her summer season with a 14:46.60 PB, then reduced it to 14:40.02 when placing third at the Wanda Diamond League meeting in Stockholm.
Ethiopian distance runner Medina Eisa (© Matthew Quine)
A few weeks later, she was part of an incredibly strong line-up at the Diamond League meeting in London and placed fourth in 14:16.54, making her the fastest U20 athlete in history. No anti-doping test was taken after the race which meant her time could not be ratified as a record, but it still counts for ranking purposes and is 14 seconds quicker than the long-standing world U20 record held by Tirunesh Dibaba.
Eisa finished a highly respectable sixth at the World Championships in Budapest, then rounded out her track campaign with a 14:28.94 runner-up finish in Brussels – again, comfortably inside Dibaba’s world U20 record.
In October Eisa returned to the roads and placed fourth in the 5km at the World Road Running Championships in Riga. Her 14:41 performance is the fastest ever by an U20 athlete.
Erriyon Knighton
It’s easy to forget that Erriyon Knighton is still an U20 athlete, given this is his third consecutive season of making senior global championship finals.
Winner of the Rising Star Award in 2021 and 2022, the US sprinter had another stellar season in 2023.
The early signs were promising; in his first race of the year, he was denied a sub-10-second 100m PB because of a 2.1m/s wind reading. Nevertheless, his wind-assisted 9.98 run – and a 46.15 PB for 400m – gave him confidence ahead of his 200m season debut.
He won his first four 200m races of the season, all with sub-20-second performances. He clocked 19.89 at the Diamond League meeting in Florence, then ran 19.95 in Bydgoszcz and 19.77 in Oslo before winning the US title in a season’s best of 19.72.
Erriyon Knighton at the World Athletics Championships Budapest 23 (© AFP / Getty Images)
At the World Championships in Budapest, Knighton claimed the silver medal behind US teammate Noah Lyles, clocking 19.75. Having finished fourth at the Olympics in 2021 and third at the World Championships in 2022, Knighton’s performance in Budapest represented his best ever finish at a senior global championships.
He rounded out his season with two more sub-20-second runs, clocking 19.87 in Zurich and 19.97 at the Diamond League final in Eugene, bringing his 2023 tally of sub-20-second runs to eight.
Knighton now holds the 13 fastest times in history by an U20 athlete; the next best (19.93) is held by Usain Bolt. Knighton also owns 18 of the 24 sub-20-second performances achieved by U20 athletes.
