Serial world record breaker Kipyegon falls short in 3 000m
Kenya’s Faith Kipyegon just missed out on the long-standing world record in the women's 3 000m at the Silesia Diamond League meet on Saturday.
Faith Kipyegon just misses out on the world 3000m record ‼️
— AW (@AthleticsWeekly) August 16, 2025
In her attempt to break Wang Junxia's 32-year-old mark of 8:06.11, the Kenyan runs 8:07.04 at the Silesia Diamond League ⚡️
Kipyegon is now the second fastest athlete over 3000m in history 🇰🇪 pic.twitter.com/TRGdELdxGX
Six weeks after improving her own 1 500m world record in Eugene, the three-time Olympic and four-time world gold medallist clocked 8min 07.04sec over the non-Olympic distance.
That fell just short of the 8:06.11 world record set by China's Wang Junxia in 1993.
KIPYEGON STUNS IN SILESIA!🔥
— FloTrack (@FloTrack) August 16, 2025
Faith Kipyegon 🇰🇪 CRUSHES the women’s 3000m in Silesia, winning in 8:07.04 to set a world lead, meet record, Diamond League record, Area record, AND the #2 all-time performance, just one second shy of Wang Junxia’s 8:06.11 WR from 1993!#SilesiaDL… pic.twitter.com/2BiM76ImiJ
Kipyegon, who also holds the mile world record and is a former world record-holder in the 5 000m, was led around the track by two pacesetters – American Sage Hurta-Klecker and Australian Jessica Hull, the Olympic silver medallist who ran a world record 5:19.70 for 2 000m in Monaco last year.
But Kipyegon had only raced the 3 000m twice before and her previous personal best of 8:23.55 was set in 2014.
After Hull pulled up with two-and-a-half laps to race, all eyes were on Kipyegon, but she left herself too much to do in the final lap and fell just short of what would have been a sixth world record at a Diamond League meet in the last three seasons.
The Kenyan came up short in her specially arranged attempt in June to become the first woman to smash through the four-minute barrier, clocking 4:06.42 in Paris.
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