IAAF World Athletics Championships 2009

GSN takes an in-depth look at how the athletic nations performed and discovers many interesting facts about the Berlin Championships.

There are some surprises among the top ten: tiny Jamaica comes is second behind the almighty USA, thanks to Bolt, Powell and the sensational ladies team, capable of beating the USA in the Ladies ranking. Jamaica also leads in point-per-count with an average of 52,8 pts for every placement, doing 25% better than the USA at 42,2.

As for points-per-population, it’s no contest!

Then there are the relentless runners of Kenya and Ethiopia, propelling their countries in 4^th and 5^th place overall. Not a surprise in many ways, as Kenya, with great Marathon and World Cross Country Championships performances too, is 2^nd in the Global Cup 2009 Athletics table.

Poland in 8^th place is also a surprise, given its 16^th place overall in the 2009 Global Cup table.

Among the surprises we also count those Global Cup Top Ten nations who finished outside of the World Championships Top Ten: France, who finished 13^th (currently 5^th in the Global Cup), Canada, a mere 24^th in the World Championships and 7^th in the Global Cup, and Italy, 20^th in Berlin and 9^th in the Global Cup table.

 

The full Top Twenty table of the IAAF World Athletics Championships is below:

 

 

 

Consistency has been the name of the game for the top nations: 7 countries made it in the Top Ten in both the Men and Ladies ranking, and not surprisingly 6 of these countries were the top six overall.

The Magnificent Seven were:

- The USA, first in the Men and second in the Ladies

- Jamaica, first in the Ladies and 4^th in the Men

- Russia, 3^rd in the Ladies and 5^th in the Men

- Kenya, 2^nd in the Men and 4^th in the Ladies

- Great Britain, 6^th in the Men and 7^th in the Ladies

- Ethiopia, 3^rd in the Men and 6^th in the Ladies

- Poland, 7^th in the Men and 9^th in the Ladies.

Below the Top Ten by gender.

MEN

 

LADIES

 

 

Few surprises in Track Athletics’ Top Ten, but some outsiders do come in: Trinidad and Tobago, strong both in the 100m and the 400m, both Men and Ladies; Bahrain, sensationally winning gold in both genders’ 1500m, Spain thanks to its women middle distance runners and walkers and the Bahamas.

 

 

The story is very different in Field Athletics, which counts for only one third of the overall points awarded in Track Athletics.

In the Field is where the host nation Germany made its mark and earned its somewhat disappointing 7^th pace overall: 80,3% of the GSN points scored by Germany came from Field (as opposed eg to 16,8% for the USA). Another of the great disappointments, China (only 9^th overall), made a decent showing in Field, where it finished 10^th, while lagging far behind on the Track, where it finished 15^th.

The other feature of Field Athletics is the much more significant sprinkling of “minor” sporting nations compared to Track. While Cuba (5^th) and the Ukraine (9^th) though small are not exactly minor, what about Portugal (one silver), Slovenia (one gold), Cyprus (one silver), all of them with little Athletics history but all capable of winning medals? Or Belarus, who placed 4 athletes in the top 8 in the Shot Put competition (either sex, must be a record)?