Five-time Olympic champion and the fastest woman alive, Elaine Sandra-Lee Thompson-Herah OD has been named the AIPS Best Female Athlete of 2021.
This follows a poll by the International Sports Press Association, where a panel of 529 journalists from 114 countries voted for the champions of 2021.
Joining Thompson-Herah in receiving the top honour is Polish footballer Robert Lewandowski, who has been named the AIPS Best Male Athlete of 2021.
The native of Banana Ground in Manchester Parish [Thompson-Herah], was also named the World Female Athlete of the Year at the World Athletics Awards 2021 early December having retained her Olympic 100m and 200m titles at the Tokyo 2020 Olympic Games and added a third gold medal in the 4x100m relay.
She also ran world-leading times of 10.54 and 21.53 over 100m and 200m respectively, moving to second on the world all-time lists for each discipline.
She topped the AIPS poll with 605 points, ahead of Spanish footballer Alexia Putellas [490 points] and Venezuela’s world triple jump record-holder and Olympic champion Yulimar Rojas [346 points].
Other athletics stars joining Thompson-Herah and Rojas in the top 10 are Kenya’s Olympic 1500m champion Faith Kipyegon and Sifan Hassan of the Netherlands, who claimed 5000m and 10,000m titles in Tokyo as well as 1500m bronze.
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