Marco Arop clocks new Canadian record in 1000m

Marco Arop‘s stellar season shows no sign of slowing down.

Team Canada’s Paris 2024 silver medallist and reigning world champion in the men’s 800m clocked a new Canadian record and world-leading time in the 1000m on Sunday at the Boris Hanžeković Memorial meet in Zagreb, Croatia. Arop raced to a time of 2:13.13 to best his previous mark of 2:14.35 in the non-Olympic event. The world record in the 1000m has stood for 25 years at 2:11.96, and is held by Kenya’s Noah Ngeny.

Fellow Canadian Paris 2024 medallists Ethan Katzberg and Jerome Blake also had successful days in Zagreb. Katzberg, who took gold in the men’s hammer throw in Paris, finished third in Zagreb with a best attempt of 79.04m. Blake, a member of Team Canada’s golden 4x100m men’s relay team at the Games, finished fourth in the 100m with a time of 10.15.

Arop’s Canadian record results sends him into the upcoming Diamond League final in Brussels, Belgium, with strong momentum. Arop himself has said the fitness of the international men’s 800m field right now is such that any given race could be an attempt on the world record. The 800m world record stand at 1:40.91, set by Kenya’s David Rushida in 2012.

Arop owns a personal best of 1:41.20, set in the Paris 2024 final, where he finished a mere one-hundredth of a second behind Emmanuel Wanyoni of Kenya. The result was a 1.65 second personal best for Arop–a significant breakthrough in a middle-distance event. This result ranks the 25-year-old as the fourth-fastest man in the history of the men’s 800m.