Canada’s Marco Arop posted a season’s-best time to finish fifth in a high-calibre men’s 800 metres race at the Diamond League track and field stop in Monaco on Friday.
The field of the Meeting Herculis EBS was comprised of all eight athletes that ran in last summer’s final at the Paris Olympic Games.
Arop, who won silver at Paris 2024, lingered near the back of the pack well into the second lap of Friday’s race. The Edmonton native crossed the line in one minute, 42.73 seconds for his best time of 2025.
Reigning Olympic champ Emmanuel Wanyonyi won with a world-leading and meet record time of 1:41.44. American Josh Hoey was second (1:42.01) while Paris bronze medallist Djamel Sedjati, of Algeria, was third (1:42.20).
Friday marked the first Diamond League appearance of the season for Arop, who was coming off a successful first season of competition in the new Grand Slam Track league. The 26-year-old from Edmonton won all three 800m races in that league before it ceased operation, and was crowned the winner of the short distance competition at the Philadelphia stop on June 1.
Olympic champion Emmanuel Wanyonyi of Kenya finishes first in the men’s 800-metre final at a World Athletics Diamond League stop in Monaco with a meet record and world-leading time of 1:41.44. Edmonton’s Marco Arop, the reigning 800-metre world champion, places fifth.
Mitton finishes 3rd
Sarah Mitton nabbed a third-place finish in the women’s shot put in Monaco.
The 29-year-old from Brooklyn, N.S., had a top throw of 20m, which slotted her behind the winner, Netherlands’ Jessica Schilder (20.39), and second-placed Chase Jackson (20.06), of the U.S.
Mitton, the defending world indoor and Diamond League final champ, now has finishes of fifth, fourth, third, and second place through four of five events this season. Those results give her 22 points in her bid to qualify for this year’s final, which will see the top six point-getters advance to the Zurich event on Aug. 27.
Jackson sits in first place with 30 points, Schilder is in second with 27, with Mitton in third.
Lyles wins in Diamond League debut
In his Diamond League debut, American star Noah Lyles captured the 200-metre event after beating Olympic champion Letsile Tebogo of Botswana.
WATCH | Lyles beats Olympic champion in 200m:
Noah Lyles of the United States, a three-time world champion in the men’s 200-metre, finishes first at a World Athletics Diamond League stop in Monaco with a time of 19.88.
Lyles, the Olympic 100m champion, crossed the line in a season-best time of 19.88 seconds. Tebogo finished in 19.97 to take second, while Zimbabwe’s Makanakaishe Charamba placed third in 19.99.
Tebogo ran the 200 in a world-leading 19.76 to win at the Prefontaine Classic last week.
