Biniam Mehary smashes world U20 10,000m record, fails to finish on podium
Biniam, the world U20 1500m record holder, smashed the world U-20 10,000m record at the Ethiopian trials and still failed a podium finish.
Biniam Mehary breaks the U-20 10000m world record. (Photo credit: World Athletics)
Ethiopia’s young sensation, Biniam Mehary, smashed the world U20 10,000m record at the Ethiopian Olympic Trials in Nerja clocking 26:37.93 seconds on Friday night.
His performance, however, did not fetch him a podium finish as his fellow countrymen were faster than him.
More specifically, the winner was Yomif Kejelcha, who scored the best performance for this year in the 10,000m, finishing at 26:31.01s. Second was Berihu Aregawi with 26:31.13 and third was Selemon Barega with 26:34.93.
Earlier Mehary had competed in Torun at the Copernicus Cup in February. As a 17-year-old, he had set a new under-20 world record in the 1500m of 3:34.83s, beating the earlier record set by Jakon Ingebrigsten in 2019.
Biniam has already represented his country in elite events. He finished ninth in the World Indoor Athletics Championship in the 1500m and secured a silver medal in the Shanghai Diamond League where he participated in the 5,000m and finished just behind his countryman Selemon Barega with a timing of 12:56.37s.
Biniam is only the fourth athlete in history to mark a sub 13 minutes 5,000m before turning 18.
Biniam may have missed out on the opportunity to represent Ethiopia at the Olympics this year, but with age on his side and an upcoming World U-20 Athletics Championship that is going to be held in Lima, Peru later this year in August, the story of Biniam is just starting to unfold as we move towards witnessing more from the wonderful athlete.