Fab five: multiple medallists at the World Championships (© Getty Images)
For sheer World Championships bling, little can match this special quintet of athletes who racked up an enviable number of medals.
Usain Bolt
14 medals: 11 gold, two silver, one bronze
No man in IAAF World Championships history has made the same seismic impact as the Jamaican sprint icon.
Across seven appearances, he gorged on 11 gold medals including three 100m and four 200m titles, which included three sprint doubles (100m and 200m). He also claimed four successive 4x100m crowns as well as silver medals in the 200m and 4x100m at the 2007 edition in Osaka and 100m bronze in London in 2017.
His crowning glory remains his still-standing 100m and 200m world records of 9.58 and 19.19 set at the 2009 World Championships in Berlin.
Carl Lewis
10 medals: eight gold, one silver, one bronze
The stylish US sprinter/jumper owned the early years of the World Championships with a series of medal-laden performances.
He won triple gold in the 100m, long jump and 4x100m at the first two World Championships in Helsinki and Rome respectively. He went on to take double gold in Tokyo in 1991, courtesy of world records in the 100m (9.86) and 4x100m (37.50), although he missed out on a ‘triple triple’ after Mike Powell’s world record winning leap denied him in an iconic long jump duel.
He claimed his 10th and final World Championships medal in Stuttgart in 1993 with 200m bronze.
Allyson Felix
16 medals: 11 gold, three silver, two bronze
Muhammad Ali may have coined the phrase ‘float like a butterfly and sting like a bee’ but the expression also seems perfectly apt to describe the World Championships career of versatile US sprint ace Allyson Felix.
The winner of more medals – 16 in total – than any other athlete in World Championship history, she mounted the top of the podium on 11 occasions. Aged just 19, Felix claimed her maiden world title over 200m in Helsinki in 2005 before going on to complete a hat-trick of half-lap titles with victories in 2007 and 2009. Later remodelled as a 400m athlete, she also clinched one-lap gold in Beijing in 2015. Seven relay gold medals added further gloss to her magnificent World Championships CV.
Shelly-Ann Fraser-Pryce
Nine medals: seven gold, two silver
The greatest female sprinter of her generation is reflected in her outstanding World Championships pedigree. Winner of 100m and 4x100m gold at the Berlin event in 2009, the diminutive Jamaican went one better four years later in Moscow when sprinting to a 100m, 200m and 4x100m treble.
In Beijing in 2015 she struck 100m and 4x100m gold once more. Fraser-Pryce was also part of Jamaica’s 4x100m silver medal winning teams in 2007 and 2011 to take her overall World Championship medal total to nine.
Mo Farah
Eight medals: six gold, two silver
The most successful distance runner in IAAF World Championships history, the Briton has snared no fewer than six gold and two silver medals in a stellar career.
Making his World Championships debut in 2007, it was not until the 2011 edition in Daegu when Farah first mounted the podium; earning silver in a narrow 10,000m defeat before winning 5000m gold. Successive long-distance doubles followed at the 2013 and 2015 World Championships before he banked 10,000m gold and 5000m silver in front of his adoring home fans in London in 2017.
Steve Landells for the IAAF
