2017 IAAF World Championships

Usain Bolt Ends His Career As Second-Best Championship Athlete Of All-Time

Usain Bolt Ends His Career As Second-Best Championship Athlete Of All-Time

Ranking the best championship performers of all-time at global championships

Aug 16, 2017 by Gordon Mack
Usain Bolt Ends His Career As Second-Best Championship Athlete Of All-Time
Two all-time greats hung up their championship track spikes last week at the IAAF World Championships in London. Mo Farah closed out his track career with two more medals finalizing his total at 12 individual medals (10 gold), while Usain Bolt ended his career with a bronze medal, upping his total to 15 individual medals (13 gold).

Below is a chart of the highest scoring athletes at outdoor global championships (World Champs/Olympic Games). The chart scores the athletes based on their career individual event finishes (1st = 10 pts, 2nd = 8 pts, 3rd = 6 pts, 4th = 5 pts, 5th = 4 pts, 6th = 3 pts, 7th = 2 pts, 8th = 1 pt). The reason relays are not included is because field athletes and distance athletes do not have relay opportunities at global championships, thus including relay finishes would inflate sprinter's careers over non-sprinters.

RNK ATHLETE PTS G S B 4 5 6 7 8
01 Carl Lewis (USA) 147 12 2 1 1 0 0 0 0
02 Usain Bolt (JAM) 145 13 1 1 0 0 0 0 1
03 Merlene Ottey (JAM) 136 2 5 10 2 1 0 1 0
04 Mohamed Farah (GBR) 121 10 2 0 0 0 1 1 0
05 Veronica Campbell-Brown (JAM) 110 4 4 3 4 0 0 0 0
06 Tirunesh Dibaba (ETH) 106 8 1 3 0 0 0 0 0
07 Jackie Joyner-Kersee (USA) 101 7 1 2 0 2 1 0 0
08 Ray Ewry (USA) 100 10 0 0 0 0 0 0 0
09 Kenenisa Bekele (ETH) 99 8 1 1 1 0 0 0 0
10 Allyson Felix (USA) 98 5 4 2 0 1 0 0 0
11 Gail Devers (USA) 92 6 2 0 1 2 1 0 0
12 Michael Johnson (USA) 90 9 0 0 0 0 0 0 0
13 Martin Sheridan (USA) 90 5 3 1 2 0 0 0 0
14 Frankie Fredericks (NAM) 90 1 7 0 3 1 1 1 0
15 Haile Gebrselassie (ETH) 89 6 2 1 0 1 1 0 0
16 Virgilijus Alekna (LTU) 89 4 2 1 4 1 1 0 0
17 Heike Drechsler (GER) 87 4 3 3 1 0 0 0 0
18 Ezekiel Kemboi (KEN) 86 6 3 0 0 0 0 1 0
19 Jan Železný (CZE) 85 6 1 2 1 0 0 0 0
20 Vivian Cheruiyot (KEN) 85 5 3 1 1 0 0 0 0
21 Justin Gatlin (USA) 84 4 4 2 0 0 0 0 0
22 Paavo Nurmi (FIN) 84 6 3 0 0 0 0 0 0
22 Hicham El Guerrouj (MAR) 84 6 3 0 0 0 0 0 0
24 Eric Lemming (SWE) 84 4 0 2 6 0 0 0 2
25 Maria Mutola (MOZ) 83 4 1 2 3 2 0 0 0
26 Valerie Adams (NZL) 82 6 2 0 0 1 0 1 0
27 Lars Riedel (GER) 81 6 1 1 1 0 0 1 0
28 Shelly-Ann Fraser-Pryce (JAM) 79 6 1 1 1 0 0 0 0
29 Tatyana Lebedeva (RUS) 78 4 3 1 1 0 1 0 0
30 Robert Korzeniowski (POL) 77 7 0 1 0 0 0 0 1
31 Bernard Lagat (USA) 76 2 4 2 1 1 1 0 0