Jakob Ingebrigtsen, Katarina Johnson-Thompson and pole-vaulter Armand Duplantis headline a list of world champions seeking a cut of €500,000 as they descend on Rome for the European Athletics Championships.
The competition will run from 7-12 June in the Italian capital and will also welcome the likes of Karsten Warholm, Gianmarco Tamberi, Miltiadis Tentoglou, Daniel Stahl, as well as Femke Bol and Yaroslava Mahuchikh.
For the first time in the history of the competition, all athletes entering will compete for an overall pot of €500,000, setting the stage for a historic summer of sport.
European Athletics President Dombromir Karamarinov said: ‘‘This is a truly historic development for the sport in Europe.
“Within athletics, we are rightly proud of our rich heritage. And to ensure our sport remains healthy, prosperous and high-profile into the future, we need to be innovative, particularly with our showpiece event, the European Athletics Championships.
“We want to see the best European athletes, delivering their best performances at our biggest competition. The performance bonuses will help achieve those aims to make Roma 2024 the exciting spectacle we all know it will be.
“Our sport has long set an example for gender equality and equal opportunities, and we often take it for granted. But we should also celebrate that equal pay and recognition for male and female disciplines is something that is both expected and delivered in athletics.
“Closer collaboration with elite athletes to promote our major events is core to the Strategic Roadmap and we welcome continued partnership to grow our sport together.”
1️⃣ week to go until #Roma2024! 🙌
— European Athletics (@EuroAthletics) May 31, 2024
Nine reigning world champions and 3️⃣4️⃣ individual European champions from Munich 2022 will be competing in the Stadio Olimpico! ✨
🔗 Final entries: https://t.co/l3B5JzOLHL pic.twitter.com/YyC2KABNyC
Thirty-four individual champions from the Munich 2022 European Athletics Championships will be competing in Rome next week, including Croatia’s Sandra Elkasevic, who will look to win a record seventh successive European title in the discus.
The entry lists also boast six athletes who lead the 2024 world lists in their respective disciplines: world record-holders Duplantis (6.24m, pole vault) and Mykolas Alekna (74.35m, discus) along with Ingebrigtsen (3:29.74, 1500m), Brits Keely Hodgkinson (1:55.78, 800m) and Molly Caudery (4.86m, pole vault) and Germany’s Max Dehning (90.20m, javelin).
France’s Melina Robert-Michon is the oldest athlete competing in the Eternal City, with the 44-year-old discus thrower contesting her seventh European Athletics Championships.
The youngest is 2023 European Athletics U20 Championships bronze medallist and 16-year-old Alexandra Stefania Uta (400m hurdles).
World record-holder and 2017 and 2022 world champion Kevin Mayer (decathlon) will also contest these championships, having received a wild card for Roma 2024 owing to his achievements in the sport.
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