Julien Alfred and Melissa Jefferson-Wooden clash in Eugene (© Getty Images)
US sprint stars Melissa Jefferson-Wooden and Noah Lyles are among the global gold medallists who will kick off their Wanda Diamond League campaign at the Golden Gala Pietro Mennea in Rome on Thursday (4).
After stops in Shanghai, Xiamen and Rabat, Rome hosts the fourth Diamond League meeting of the season – the first of five Diamond League events taking place throughout June.
Rome promises fireworks and Lyles will want to put on a show when he races in the final event on the programme.
The 100m features a clash of Olympic champions as Lyles, who won the 100m in Paris, renews his rivalry with Botswana’s Letsile Tebogo, the 200m champion in the French capital.
Lyles clocked 9.95 to win at the Tokyo Continental Tour Gold meeting last month, while Tebogo will want to build on his runner-up finish over 200m in Rabat after finishing eighth in the 100m in Xiamen.
But it won’t only be a two-athlete battle as the field also features USA’s world indoor 60m champion Jordan Anthony, who has run 9.91 so far this season, as well as Akani Simbine, Ackeem Blake, Ferdinand Omanyala and home favourite Marcell Jacobs.
Jefferson-Wooden is not easing herself in gently as she makes her individual season debut in the 200m against world leader Julien Alfred, who ran 21.86 in Texas in April. It is the first time the two global champions have gone head-to-head over half a lap.
Jefferson-Wooden achieved a sprint treble at the World Championships in Tokyo in September, adding 100m, 200m and 4x100m titles to the Olympic 4x100m gold and 100m bronze she secured in Paris.
Saint Lucia’s Alfred topped that Olympic 100m podium and then got world 100m bronze behind Jefferson-Wooden in Tokyo. Great Britain’s Amy Hunt is another world medallist in action as the top two from the 200m in Tokyo clash again. Hunt’s compatriot Dina Asher-Smith, the 2019 world champion, joins the race along with USA’s Anavia Battle and Nigeria’s Favour Ofili.
The 400m features Great Britain’s Olympic 800m champion Keely Hodgkinson as she tests herself over one lap. The 24-year-old opens her outdoor season, in her first race since winning the world indoor 800m title at the end of a short track campaign that included a world record in the 800m and a PB of 51.49 in the 400m.
Making her Diamond League 400m debut, she races specialists Natalia Bukowiecka, Lurdes Gloria Manuel, Henriette Jæger and Lieke Klaver. Poland’s Olympic bronze medallist Bukowiecka opened her 400m season with a win in Bydgoszcz on Friday after getting world indoor silver between Manuel and Klaver in Toruń. Manuel, Klaver and 2025 world indoor bronze medallist Jæger all contest their first outdoor 400m race of the season.
Former world record-holder Kendra Harrison faces two-time world champion Danielle Williams, Nadine Visser and Pia Skrzyszowska in the 100m hurdles, while the 110m hurdles pits the in-form Jamal Britt, who won in Shanghai and Xiamen, against Rachid Muratake and Trey Cunningham in his first race since getting world indoor bronze.
Emma Zapletalová and Anna Cockrell race the 400m hurdles again after battling for the victory – narrowly claimed by Zapletalová – in Rabat.
Big shots in the field
USA’s two-time world shot put champion Joe Kovacs, home star Leonardo Fabbri and Jamaica’s Olympic bronze medallist Rajindra Campbell have all surpassed 22 metres outdoors already this year and they will battle for top spot in Rome. Kovacs threw a world lead of 22.58m to beat world record-holder and multiple global champion Ryan Crouser in Rabat and they renew their rivalry as part of a stacked field that also features all thee medallists from this year’s World Indoor Championships: Tom Walsh, Jordan Geist and Roger Steen.
This year’s javelin top two – world leader Rumesh Tharanga Pathirage of Sri Lanka and Grenada’s Anderson Peters – switched that order in Rabat, where Peters won by just 11 centimetres. They go again in Rome, joined by Julius Yego, Keshorn Walcott and Jakub Vadlejch.
Australia’s Olympic champion Nina Kennedy will want to build on her 4.80m pole vault victory in Rabat – her first Diamond League event since 2024. She again faces Angelica Moser, Molly Caudery and Sandi Morris.
Ukraine’s Oleh Doroshchuk is another athlete competing for the first time since the World Indoor Championships and all three medallists are in action as champion Doroshchuk is joined by Mexico’s Erick Portillo and Jamaica’s Raymond Richards. The full world indoor podium features in the men’s triple jump, too, as home star Andy Díaz Hernández takes on Jordan Scott and Yasser Mohammed Triki.
Miltiádis Tentóglou leads the long jump field after his 8.49m leap in Limassol but fans won’t get to see him renew his rivalry with home star Mattia Furlani after the world champion sustained an injury in Xiamen.
The home crowd will have Nadia Battocletti to cheer in the 5000m, however, as the double world medallist returns to the scene of her 14:23.15 national record. She achieved that when finishing third behind Beatrice Chebet and Freweyni Hailu last year and Hailu also returns.
Ethiopia’s Birke Haylom and Australia’s Abbey Caldwell have one 1500m win apiece following their victories in Shanghai and Xiamen, respectively, and they clash again in Rome.
