Saint Lucia’s Julien Alfred finished second in the social media fan voting for the World Athletics Track Athlete of the Year.
Voting closed on Monday, with fans able to vote via X, Instagram, and Facebook. The top two nominees from multiple streams of voting will be invited to the World Athletics Gala in Monaco in December.
Alfred, the Olympic 100m champion, dominated the Facebook vote with 37,000 votes. Kenya’s Faith Kipyegon won a third Olympic 1500m title, and broke the World record in her event. She was second with 35,000. No other athlete got more than 18,000.
With two rounds of voting on Instagram, 400m hurdles World record holder and Olympic champion Sydney McLaughlin-Levrone of the USA dominated with over 180,000 votes.
Fellow American and 200m Olympic champion Gabby Thomas, Alfred, and 400m gold medallist Marileidy Paulino of the Dominican Republic got over 80,000 each.
X, formerly known as Twitter, had the lowest voting numbers. Kipyegon tallied nearly 15,000 votes. Fellow Kenyan Beatrice Chebet, 5K and 10K champion in Paris, and 10K World record holder, got just over 5,000 votes. Alfred got over 2,500.
At the close of voting on Monday, McLaughlin-Levrone had a total of nearly 190,000 votes, carried almost entirely by Instagram. Alfred totalled 126,906, well ahead of Kipyegon with 98,000, and Thomas on just over 92,000.
Social media voting will account for a quarter of the final tally. The World Athletics Council’s vote will count for 50 per cent of the result, while the World Athletics Family’s votes will count for 25 per cent of the result.
Once the two finalists have been established on November 4, a fan vote will open – for all registered users of Inside Track – to help determine the overall World Athletes of the Year.
Juju to the world! We appreciate you Juju.
Alfred’s accomplishments deserve a first place finish. If the way to get there is by popularity there is no guarantee. To defy the odds, Juju will have to beat them on the tracks. Go juju !
So proud of our queen.
It would of been difficult to beat Sidney, especially after her performance in the hurdles, a d off course the size of her social media following.
The above mentioned athletes are all to be celebrated.
Congratulations to them all.
As a St. Lucian, I commend Ms. Alfred for all that she has done and will do. However, Sydney deserves first place as she is in a class all by herself and has been in this business and doing very well for quite some time. Sydney is also very humble and respectful – I have been watching her progress for several years.
Ms. Alfred has done extremely well as a second place winner even for her first gold and silver medal and she should be very proud of her accomplishment. I wish nothing but the best for her.
we love you juju 758