Isaac Nader won a thrilling sprint finish to claim the men’s 1500m title at the World Athletics Championships in Tokyo on Wednesday (17).
It is the biggest achievement yet for the Portuguese athlete, who took European indoor bronze in March.
Nader was not among the pre-race favourites, but he executed his tactics perfectly. In a slower race, he stayed in contention and launched his kick down the home straight, edging past Britain’s Jake Wightman on the line.
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Thrilling sprint
Wightman had surged to the front with 200 metres to go and looked poised to add another world title to the one he won in Oregon in 2022. But in the final charge - which also featured the Netherlands’ Niels Laros and Kenya’s Timothy Cheruiyot and Reynold Cheruiyot - Nader found a clear path and steadily reeled in his rivals.
He caught and passed Wightman in the closing strides, stopping the clock at 3:34.10, just 0.02 ahead of the Briton making it the smallest winning margin in World Athletics Championships history. Reynold Cheruiyot secured bronze in 3:34.12. For Wightman, silver was still a superb result after two injury-affected years.
Laros, who entered the final in top form after winning the Diamond League Final, led the race through the first half. He tried to respond to Wightman’s surge but couldn’t muster a final kick, finishing fifth in 3:34.52.
Defending champion Josh Kerr of Great Britain sat in the pack early on, but with 600 metres to go he began to lose contact, clearly hampered by injury. He limped home in 14th, clocking 4:11.23.
Historic night
For Portugal, it was a night of celebration. Nader joins 1997 women’s 1500m champion Carla Sacramento as only the second Portuguese athlete ever to win a 1500m title at the World Athletics Championships.
He is also only the third male athlete from Portugal to win gold at the World Athletics Championships, following triple jumpers Nelson Evora (2007) and Pedro Pichardo (2022).
"One of my dreams accomplished"
"In the last 100 I fully believed in myself," said a delighted Nader afterwards. "I knew Jake would be fighting until the end so I went all in for a dive. This was probably the first time I did it in my career but I couldn't risk losing a world title.
"Clearly, it paid off in the end. I have no words for what happened, but I believed in myself and so did my family and girlfriend (Salome Afonso). In fact the two of us are our own training group. We are together 24/7 and she is at every session, even more than my coach because he doesn't go to every altitude training camp.
"Having this group believing in me and supporting me is what really matters. Some people criticised me and said I would never achieve this but here I am - world champion and the first Portuguese man to win a global gold in the 1500m. Unfortunately I wasn't able to hear the Portuguese team cheering for me because the crowd here is so loud.
"This is just one of my dreams accomplished, the other will have to wait until 2028. Winning gold in Los Angeles isn't a promise, simply a dream. Next year I will go into the European Championships (Birmingham) as the world champion, and for the world championships the year after (Beijing, 2027), so I will pace myself and take each event as it comes."
"Bitter sweet" for Wightman
"I did not see what was happening in the race, I was fully focused on my own race, the last 200, and I was just trying to win it so badly," said Wightman afterwards. "To get that close, it is bitter sweet. But I am glad to come out with something. It has been a very long time. That I am still at the level I want to be is very justifying."
"I was not betting on Nader. I thought if someone was going to go, it would be Laros. But fair pay to Nader - he ran a very very good race. When you just go to race like that and it comes down to the last 200, it can be anybody's race and I am glad I was the one out there.
"The race three years ago (when he won the 2022 world title), that was more tactical and it more predictable. You could set up the plan around what Jakob (Ingebrigtsen) was going to do, whereas this one no one knew what was going to happen. To be able to come through like that and perform on this stage was really special. You just race who is there, so I tried to beat whoever I could. It is never easy."