Yaroslava Mahuchikh and Armand Duplantis have been crowned 2024 European Athletes of the Year at the Golden Tracks award night in Skopje, Republic of North Macedonia on Saturday (26) evening.
Mahuchikh and Duplantis both won European and Olympic titles and set world records in their respective events in 2024. Incidentally, both winners are also past winners of the Rising Star trophy, an award which recognises Europe’s most outstanding young athletes.
This year’s Rising Star winners are Serbia’s European javelin silver medallist Adriana Vilagos and Olympic 1500m sixth-placer Niels Laros from the Netherlands.
The Golden Tracks awards night was held in the city’s National Opera and Ballet house and attended by the Republic of North Macedonian Vice Prime Minister Ljubco Dimovski and Sport Minister Borko Ristovski. The event was also televised nationally and streamed live on the European Athletics YouTube channel.
Mahuchikh and Duplantis share senior honours in Skopje
Yaroslava Mahuchikh was crowned women’s European Athlete of the Year for the first time, taking the award ahead of fellow European and Olympic champions Keely Hodgkinson and Femke Bol, the 2022 and 2023 European Athlete of the Year.
Mahuchikh, who was presented with her trophy by European Athletics President Dobromir Karamarinov, retained her European title in Rome before completing the set of major gold medals in the high jump at the Paris 2024 Olympic Games at the age of 22.
But arguably her greatest accomplishment came one month prior in the Paris Diamond League where Mahuchikh rewrote the record books, clearing 2.10m at the Charlety Stadium to break Stefka Kostadinova’s enduring world record of 2.09m which was set at the 1987 World Athletics Championships in Rome.
Mahuchikh, who was crowned women’s Rising Star in 2019, becomes just the second Ukrainian to be crowned European Athlete of the Year after fellow high jumper Bogdan Bondarenko won the award in 2013.
On the men’s side, Sweden’s Armand Duplantis was crowned men’s European Athlete of the Year for the first time outright having previously shared the award with Jakob Ingebrigtsen in 2022. The pair also shared the Rising Star trophy in 2018.
Duplantis was shortlisted for the accolade alongside Olympic 5000m champion and world 3000m record-holder Ingebrigtsen and Greece’s Olympic and European long jump champion Miltiadis Tentoglou, making this year’s finalist list arguably the strongest in award history.
Duplantis amassed one of the greatest seasons in sporting history, defending his titles at the World Athletics Indoor Championships, European Athletics Championships and Olympic Games and clearing world records of 6.24m, 6.25m and 6.26m en route to an unbeaten season indoors and outdoors.
Duplantis finished the summer season with the ownership of the eight best vaults of the season. He also cleared a championship record of 6.10m to win his third successive European outdoor title in Rome in June.
Rising Star trophies for Vilagos and Laros
Serbia’s Adriana Vilagos and Niels Laros from the Netherlands were named this year’s Rising Stars, a trophy which was introduced in 2007 to recognise the achievements of Europe’s best young athletes.
Still only 20, Vilagos won silver again in the javelin at the European Athletics Championships in Rome and finished the year ranked second on the 2024 European list with a Serbian record of 65.64m.
At 19, Laros was the youngest athlete to reach the 1500m final at the Paris 2024 Olympic Games where he finished an excellent sixth in a European U20 record of 3:29.54, shaving half-a-second off the previous mark of 3:30.16 held by Jakob Ingebrigtsen.
Laros also rewrote the record books over 1000m, taking a win at home at the FBK Games in Hengelo in a world U20 and European U23 record of 2:14.39 and showed his versatility by setting a European U20 5km best of 13:26 in Monaco in February.
A special Team Spirit Award was also awarded at the Golden Tracks to the Italian team which dominated the medal table at the Roma 2024 European Athletics Championships.
The Italian team topped the standings at home in the Stadio Olimpico with 11 gold medals and 24 medals in total, the most medals ever accrued by a host nation in the history of the European Athletics Championships.
The award was presented by European Athletics CEO Christian Milz and jointly accepted on behalf of the entire Italian team by Antonella Palmisano and Leonardo Fabbri who won the 20km race walk and shot put titles respectively in Rome.
The first of the annual European Athletics Member Federations awards was awarded on-stage to Toni Lazarov from the Republic of North Macedonia and Hungary’s Krisztina Szabadkaine Vago while the first European Athletics Coaching Awards of 2024 were handed out to Serbians Dragutin Topic and Derdi Vilagos.
In total, 51 people from 30 Member Federations have been nominated for a European Athletics Member Federation award this year and 66 coaches from 23 Member Federations will receive a European Athletics Coaching Award.
Award recipients at the 2024 Golden Tracks award night
- Women’s European Athlete of the Year - Yaroslava Mahuchikh (UKR)
- Men’s European Athlete of the Year - Armand Duplantis (SWE)
- Women’s Rising Star - Adriana Vilagos (SRB)
- Men’s Rising Star - Niels Laros (NED)
- Team Spirit Recognition Award - Team Italy at the Roma 2024 European Athletics Championships
- Coaching Award - Dragutin Topic (SRB) and Derdi Vilagos (SRB)
- Member Federation Award - Toni Lazarov (MKD) and Krisztina Szabadkaine Vago (HUN)