World Athletics commits an extra USD 1million prize money for athletes at World Athletics Championships

The international federation for athletics, World Athletics announced on 20th June that it will commit an extra US$1million prize money for athletes at the World Athletics Championships to be held in Oregon in 2022.

An amount of US$2million has been ring-fenced from the fines paid by the Russian Athletics Federation for breaching the sport’s anti-doping rules. That fund will directly go to athletes in the form of prize money at the Oregon 2022 and Budapest 2023 World Championships.

“The last 18 months have been really tough for thousands of athletes who make their living from competing in events around the world. While we have focused on helping meetings around the world stage as many events as possible over this period – more than 600 events – we know many athletes had a very lean year last year and are still experiencing challenges this year,” World Athletics president Sebastian Coe said.

“Last year we also set up an athlete fund, supported by some generous donations, to provide some financial relief to those athletes most in need. 193 athletes from 58 countries were granted up to US$3000 to go towards basic living costs such as food, accommodation and training expenses,” he added, speaking from the US Olympic Trials in Eugene, Oregon.

World Athletics to fund an additional $1million per World Championships for the next two editions

In the most recently held World Championships held in Doha in 2019, US$7,530,000 were distributed to the athletes who finished in the top eight of an event.

Now, in a statement released by World Athletics, it has announced that the body will fund an additional $1million per World Championships for the next two editions. Each of the 44 individual events will receive an additional USD 23,000 of prize money at each championship.

“While the intention is to see the new funds go to as many athletes as possible in leading positions, the Athletes’ Commission and Competition Commission will make a recommendation to the World Athletics Council on how the funds will be allocated. The additional US$1 million in prize money will form part of the host city contract from 2025 onwards,” the statement read further.