Budapest Kicks Off Inaugural World Athletics Ultimate Championship Featuring Record $10m Prize Pot

Sweden’s Armand ‘Mondo’ Duplantis is a favourite to break the men’s pole vault world record after claiming it 15 times, most recently in March. The “best of the best” in athletics are preparing to compete in the inaugural World Athletics Ultimate Championship that gets under way in Budapest this weekend.

The three-day competition will see 26 Olympic champions from Paris, 26 world champions from Tokyo last year, and this season’s top athletes battle it out to be crowned the best in track and field. Many return to the stomping ground in the Hungarian capital after successes at the 2023 World Championships, while others have racked up global titles after breakout performances throughout the year.

The Ultimate Championship is an invite-only competition featuring the Olympic gold medallist, World Championship gold medallist, Diamond League winners, and the best performers of 2026 based on the World Rankings qualification system. It runs from September 11-13 in Budapest and will become a biennial feature in World Athletics’ calendar.

Jamaican sprint legend Usain Bolt, an ambassador for the event, said it was “great to see track and field going in a different direction”. The former sprinter Usain Bolt, now 40, still holds the world record in the men’s 100m and 200m.

The $10m prize pot will see winners of each event bag a record $150,000, which is more than double the $70,000 given at last year’s World Championships in Tokyo. Second place takes home $75,000, third place $40,000, all the way to $2,000 for 16th-place finishers.

For one, there are no medals, replaced instead by a customised trophy for the Ultimate Champions based on individual tokens as part of World Athletics' reimagining of awards. All events will be direct semifinals or finals rather than starting off as heats.

A number of events have been excluded from the Ultimate Championship, including shot put, triple jump, women’s hammer throw, and discus throw, drawing criticism from athletes like Olympic discus champion Matthew Denny and former world champion Pedro Pichardo.

Athletes most likely to set a world record based on this year's performance include Armand ‘Mondo’ Duplantis in the men’s pole vault, Emanuel Wanyonyi in the men’s 800m, Audrey Werro in the women’s 800m, Alison dos Santos in the men’s 400m hurdles, and Masai Russell in the women’s 100m hurdles.