Athens '97

Ukraine pole vault legend Sergey Bubka won his sixth successive gold medal in his specialist event, a feat which is still unique, with a championship record of 6.01m.

In addition to Bubka’s feat, two other championship records fell. Czech Republic’s Tomas Dvorak set four personal bests in the decathlon en-route to a tally of 8837 points while a USA quartet anchored by Gail Devers sped to 4x100m victory in 41.47, the second fastest time ever.

South African javelin thrower Marius Corbett was among several surprise winners, reaching an African record of 88.40m, while the outstanding performer in the women’s field events was the Czech triple jumper Sarka Kasparkova, who won with 15.20m to move up to number two on the all-time lists.