World Championships: Women's 400m hurdles
A global IAAF 400m hurdles title was awarded three years before the first World Championships. While the 10,000m at the same venue attracted just four runners, the Sittard hurdles event in 1980 was a proper championship and necessitated three rounds.
The East German-dominated race was won by the 1979 World Cup winner Barbel Broschat by a hundredth of a second from team-mate Ellen Neumann before Petra Pfaff ensured a clean sweep.
A B final was won by Rosa Colorado, who failed a drugs test and was disqualified.
In Helsinki in 1983, the margin was again one hundredth and the leading East German ran 54.55, but this time it was behind a Russian one-two as Yekaterina Fesenko edged Ana Ambraziene. Neumann (formerly Fiedler) won her second medal in third as GDR had three in five and Briton Susan Morley was seventh in 56.04.
The championships’ first sub-54 was run in Rome in 1987 as the technically inefficient Sabine Busch won easily in 53.62 to make the all-time top 10. Five metres behind in second was eventual Olympic champion Debbie Flintoff-King. In the Seoul Olympics, the Australian won as the leader Tatyana Ledovskaya eased up before the line.
The Russian reluctantly returned in Tokyo and looked unfit and overweight as she was beaten in her heat and semi-final. However, in the final she started fast and sprinted to a clear lead. She tired in the straight but held on to win by just five hundredths of a second in 53.11, the second quickest time in history.
European champion Sally Gunnell was a close second in a Commonwealth record 53.16 and, but for stuttering into the last hurdle and also clashing arms with Sandra Farmer-Patrick over the hurdle, would have won.
Farmer-Patrick finished fourth for the USA, having occupied the same position for Jamaica in 1987 but she was in better form in Stuttgart in 1993. There she ran a brilliant race, starting quickly and finishing stronger than normal as her 52.79 was under the world record. However, it wasn’t good enough for gold as Gunnell edged past in the 40m run-in and won in 52.74, meaning the Briton was Olympic, world, European and Commonwealth champion.
Many viewed that race as one of the greatest in any event at a world championships and yet the race in Gothenburg in 1995 was better and faster. A modest 56.75 made the final – it took 54.53 in Stuttgart – and only two broke 55 second in the semi-finals, but the final saw a tremendous race between Americans Kim Batten and Tonja Buford.
Batten, who had been fifth and fourth in the previous two championships, prevailed by a hundredth of a second in a world record 52.61, with Buford also inside the old record.
Deon Hemmings, who won bronze, would go on to win at the 1996 Olympics and was favourite for Athens in 1997. She built up a clear lead and appeared to be heading for an easy victory. However, Morocco’s Nezha Bidouane, who had been a second behind at halfway and a distant fourth with 100m to go, finished like a train and eased past in the final few strides to win in 52.97, taking half a second off her African record, set in her semi-final. She had failed to even make the final in her previous world championships in 1991, 1993 and 1995.
World record-holder Batten took third in her fourth final. In her heat, Gunnell had run 54.53, which would have been good enough for sixth in the final, but she injured herself in the warm-down and never raced a major event again.
The Moroccan improved her African record to 52.90 in Seville in 1999 and, thinking she won, began a lap of honour. However, it turned out World University Games champion Daimi Pernia had stolen a shock victory. She had begun the year with a PB of 55.51 and failed to win her heat and semi-final. She built up a good lead but hit the last hurdle badly and appeared to ruin her chances of gold. However, she fought back after Bidouane challenged her and the pair went through the line together. The Cuban clocked 52.89 as Hemmings was third.
Bidouane had been embarrassed in Spain but made no mistakes in Edmonton in 2001, winning by a record margin of almost a second in a world- leading 53.34. Pernia was third and Hemmings, in a record fifth final, was seventh.
Yuliya Pechonkina was a big favourite for Paris in 2003 as she had set a world record of 52.34 three weeks earlier. However, after building up a big lead she faded dramatically and was caught by the young Australian Jana Pittman, who won in 53.22.
Pechonkina fared better in Helsinki and proved too strong for Lashinda Demus, winning in 52.90. The Russian returned in Osaka in 2007 but was again beaten by the Australian, who after marrying the British hurdler Chris, was now Rawlinson and won in 53.31 to regain the title, though Pechonkina won a record fourth medal.
In Berlin in 2009, Demus was back in form and built up an early lead but Melaine Walker, a semi- finalist in 2007, finished strongly and won in 52.42 to go to second all-time and come within eight hundredths of the world record. Her biggest worry of the event was being dropped heavily on her backside by the mascot Berlino on her lap of honour!
Demus and Walker had another battle in Daegu in 2011 but this time the American proved the strongest and won in an American record 52.47 to go to third all-time.
In Moscow in 2013, former world youth champion Zuzana Hejnova, who was competing in her fourth world championships, won in a Czech record of 52.83. Her margin of victory of 1.26 seconds was a record. Demus won her fourth medal in third.
Britain’s Eilidh Child finished fifth but the UK’s best hope for a medal, Perri Shakes-Drayton, injured herself in the final and struggled home in seventh and hasn’t competed in the two years since. She had won her semi-final in 53.92, which only Hejnova bettered in the final.
Year | Winner | Time | GB position and mark
1980 Barbel Broschat (GDR) 54.55 Christine Warden DQ (57.26 ht)
1983 Yekaterina Fesenko (URS) 54.14 7 Susan Morley 56.04
1987 Sabine Busch (GDR) 53.62 No competitor
1991 Tatyana Ledovskaya (RUS) 53.11 2 Sally Gunnell 53.16
1993 Sally Gunnell (GBR) 52.74 (2 Sandra Farmer-Patrick (USA) 52.79
1995 Kim Batten (USA) 52.61 6 ht Louise Fraser 57.99
1997 Nezha Bidouane (MAR) 52.97 DNS sf Sally Gunnell (54.53 ht)
1999 Daimi Pernia (CUB) 52.89 6 SF Sinead Dudgeon 55.69 (55.38 ht)
2001 Nezha Bidouane (MAR) 53.34 8 SF Sinead Dudgeon 56.92 (56.07 ht)
2003 Jana Pittman (AUS) 53.22 7 SF Natasha Danvers 55.48
2005 Yuliya Pechonkina (RUS) 52.90 DQ SF Nicola Sanders (56.83 ht)
2007 Jana Rawlinson (AUS) 53.31 8 Tasha Danvers-Smith 54.94 (54.08 SF)
2009 Melaine Walker (JAM) 52.42 6 SF Eilidh Child 56.21 (55.96 ht)
2011 Lashinda Demus (USA) 52.47 3 SFPerri Shakes-Drayton 55.07
2013 Zuzana Hejnová (CZE) 52.83 5 Eilidh Child 54.86 (54.32 SF – Shakes Drayton 53.92 SF)
Points table (8 for 1st etc)
1. USA 133
2. JAM 69
3. GER 68
4. RUS 47
5. UKR 33
6. GBR 29
7. URS 27
8. AUS 25
9. MAR 23
10. CUB 14
» Find other event-by-event history features here
