Hodgkinson Shatters Indoor 800m Record
Olympic champion Keely Hodgkinson ran 1:54.87 in Lievin, France, breaking Jolanda Ceplak's 24-year-old indoor 800m world record set on the very day Hodgkinson was born. The performance marks her 10th international medal and continues to redefine women's middle-distance running.
- The previous record of 1:55.82 was set by Slovenia's Jolanda Ceplak at the European Indoor Championships in Vienna. - Hodgkinson's time of 1:54.87 makes her the first woman in history to run the indoor 800m in under 1 minute and 55 seconds. - This performance is remarkably close to her outdoor personal best of 1:54.61, set in July 2024. - She is coached by the husband-and-wife team of Trevor Painter and former world bronze medallist Jenny Meadows. - The record was broken at the Meeting Hauts-de-France Pas-de-Calais, a World Athletics Indoor Tour Gold event held in Liévin, France. - This is Hodgkinson's first senior world record; she also holds the world indoor 600m best time, set in 2023. - Next, Hodgkinson is expected to compete at the World Athletics Indoor Championships in Torun, Poland, from March 20-22, 2026. - The outdoor women's 800m world record, considered one of the toughest in athletics, is 1:53.28, set by Jarmila Kratochvilova in 1983.
