Prudence Sekgodiso created history when she became the first South African to win a medal in the 800m at a World Indoor Championships – and she did so with a GOLD in the final in Nanjing, China.
The 23-year-old is enjoying the best season of her career and she surged to victory on the third and final day of the World Indoor Championships, a perfectly-timed race seeing her sprint away from Ethiopia’s Nigist Getachew in the last 100m to win in 1min 58.40sec.
Sekgodiso, a finalist in her first Olympics in Paris last year, has been in superb form in 2025 and went into the final as the second-fastest qualifier. In the final, a field of six over four 200m laps, she sat in third position behind the Ethiopians of Getachew snd Tsiga Duguma, before powering away on the last lap and stopping the clock in the fastest time of the year.
Sekgodiso’s winning time is her fourth sub-2min run of the season and so fast was the race that even fourth and fifth-place finishers Switzerland’s Audrey Werro and newly crowned European indoor champion Anna Wielgosz set an national record of 1:59.81 and a PB of 2:00.34, respectively.
“It’s a surprise. You have the world’s fastest in the race, but I believed that I could make it, and to make it and grab that gold medal, I’m proud,” said Sekgodiso. “I did dream of this, I’ve been working so hard for this. We have a long season ahead and I believe there’s still more to come.”
She is the second South African to win a medal at the Championships, following Akani Simbine’s bronze in the men’s 60m.
The other two athletes representing the country were also involved in Sunday action.
In the men’s shot put Chris van Niekerk finished 14th in the one-off final with a distance of 19.47m, while Cheswill Johnson placed12th in the men’s long jump after a leap of 7.64m.
