Norway's Jakob Ingebrigtsen races to 2000m world record

Norway's Jakob Ingebrigtsen has set a world record in the 2000 metres in the Diamond League meeting in Brussels.

On a warm Friday evening in the Belgian capital, the 22-year-old Ingebrigtsen, who is the world 5000m and Olympic 1500m champ, set a time of 4 minutes 43.13 seconds to beat the previous best of 4:44.79 set by Morocco's Hicham El Guerrouj in 1999.

Ingebrigtsen was racing for the first time since last month's World Championships in Budapest, when his brilliant season hit a rare roadblock when he was beaten for 1500m gold by Britain's Josh Kerr - his only defeat of a stellar season.

Ingebrigtsen now has three world records and world bests in his career - the 2000m and indoor 1500m are official world records, while he also owns the two-mile landmark, set in Paris in June.

Ingebrigtsen said he had been helped by pacemakers going a little further than expected and now had a thirst for further records, from his speciality of 1500m eventually to as much as a marathon.

"I think I'm at a point in my career where I can challenge all the records as well. So that's going to continue to be the goal in the future," he told a press conference.

There were no Australian winners in the penultimate Diamond League meeting before the finals in Eugene next weekend, with world high jump silver medallist Eleanor Patterson enjoying their best result in the night, with a third place finish (1.94 metres) behind the victor, Ukrainian world champ Yaroslava Mahuchikh (2.00m).

In the women's 1500m, Britain's Laura Muir needed her season's best time of 3:55.34 to hold off Ciara Mageean, who set an Irish national record of 3:55.87, in a tight duel for the line. Australian Jess Hull was fourth in 3:57.75.

Among other stand-out performances were Jamaican sprinter Shericka Jackson in the 200m and Japanese javelin thrower Haruka Kitaguchi, both crowned world champions last month.

Jackson was far too strong for the competition but having targeted a world record on the new, faster Brussels track, she had to settle for a Diamond League event record of 21.48, seven-hundredths of a second outside her world championship-winning run in Budapest last month, the second fastest women's 200m of all-time.

Kitaguchi threw a 2023 world-leading distance of 67.38m in the final round to secure victory against a strong women's javelin line-up.

In the 400 metre hurdles, Dutch world champion Femke Bol destroyed the opposition to set a meeting record of 52.11sec.

Jamaican Olympic champion Elaine Thompson-Herah, the world's fastest sprinter still competing, showed a return to form after an injury-hit season with victory in the 100m in a season's best 10.84sec.

With AP