Kenyan woman runs 14:03.69 at the Diamond League in Rome as Nadia Battocletti smashes Italian record on home soil with 14:23.15
There was no world record in the women’s 5000m at the Diamond League in Rome on Thursday (June 6) but Beatrice Chebet of Kenya ran the second fastest time in history as she clocked a blistering 14:03.69 to win in style.
Chebet was chasing Gudaf Tsegay’s world record of 14:00.21 and Tsegay was also in this race, but the Ethiopian blew up with four laps to go, eventually finishing fifth.
After Winnie Nanyondo and Margaret Akidor had set the early pace, Chebet took over as the leaders passed 3000m in 8:32. The Olympic 5000m and 10,000m champion then increased the pace, breaking up the field and seeing off Tsegay’s challenge as she established a big lead.
Romping away, Chebet won by 16 seconds from Freweyni Hailu of Ethiopia, who clocked 14:19.33 in second.
Racing in front of her home crowd, Nadia Battocletti smashed her Italian record by eight seconds with 14:23.15 in third. After boldly going with the early pace, Battocletti got dropped and appeared to fade mid-race but she recovered to finish strongly to go No.2 on the European all-time rankings behind Sifan Hassan.
Birke Haylom of Ethiopia was fourth in 14:24.20 with Josette Andrews the best of an American trio with a PB of 14:25.37.
One week before the British 10,000m trials in Birmingham, Britain’s Megan Keith endured a lonely race as she finished at the back of the field in 15:16.91, narrowly avoiding being lapped by Chebet.
The winner, who had gone No.2 on the world all-time 3000 rankings in Rabat last month with 8:11.56, said: “I just said, ‘let’s run my own race today’. I was planning to run 14:15, but I felt like my body was moving and I decided to go. My body is in a good shape and I am capable of of the world record. So now I am going home and will prepare for it.”
Battocletti said: “Wow! I was thinking about beating the national record but not this soon and not in this way. Today’s aim was to improve my PB and it worked.
“This is incredible, I guess this is the second fastest time ran by a European. Amazing. The season is long and I hope to be able to keep the emotion and the shape.”
Sarah Healy, the Irish runner who is part of the Manchester-based M11 track club, continued her fine 2025 season with a Diamond League win as she took the women’s 1500m in 3:59.16.
Healy, who won the European indoor 3000m title earlier this year, edged out Australian duo Sarah Billings and Abbey Caldwell.
Brits Katie Snowden and Revee Walcott-Nolan clocked 4:02.02 and 4:02.28 respectively but were back in 11th and 12th.
Another Brit in action in Rome was Amy Hunt, who ran superbly in the women’s 200m to finish runner-up to Anavia Battle of the United States.
Battle clocked 22.53 (0.8) with the fast-finishing Hunt running a season’s best of 22.67 as Marie-Jose Ta Lou of the Ivory Coast was third with 22.75.
Hunt, who is based in Italy, said: “I really thought I could get her (Battle) today. Coming here, we have been training so well, but my warm up was just a mess – we were finding so many issues.
“I did not even think I was going to make the start line, so to come second in that race, I am really happy, because I managed to stay strong in the end.”
Trayvon Bromell’s career has sadly been peppered with injuries but when the American is healthy he is a brilliant talent. He showed it here with a world lead in the 100m with 9.84 (1.1) as Emmanuel Eseme with 9.99 and Ferdinand Omanyala with 10.01 finished second and third.
A thrilling men’s 400m saw Olympic champion Quincy Hall of the United States edging out world leader Zakithi Nene of South Africa by one hundredth of a second in 44.22.
Charlie Dobson was fourth in 44.64, as the Brit finished ahead of athletes such as Vernon Norwood, Kirani James and Alexander Doom.
Azeddine Habz of France ran 3:29.72 to pip Timothy Cheruiyot in a fast men’s 1500m that featured a series of PBs as Elliott Giles of Britain ran a season’s best of 3:31.13 in seventh.
Andrenette Knight of Jamaica took the women’s 400m hurdles in 53.67 as Britain’s Lina Nielsen was fourth with 54.66.
Biggest cheer of the night came in the men’s long jump when Mattia Furlani of Italy jumped 8.13m in the last round to overtake Miltos Tentoglou of Greece, who had held the lead with 8.10m.
Furlani’s delight didn’t last long, though, as Liam Adcock of Australia stepped up and uncorked a PB of 8.34m to take the victory.
An Italian was also denied victory in the men’s shot as Zane Weir’s 21.67m saw him finish runner-up behind New Zealand’s Tom Walsh, who threw 21.89m.
Elsewhere in the field, Sandi Morris of the United States won the women’s pole vault with 4.80m, Valarie Allman of the United States set a meeting record of 69.21m in the women’s discus, Woo Sang-hyeok of South Korea won the men’s high jump with 2.32m and Jamaica’s Shanieka Ricketts won the women’s triple jump with 14.64m.
