The 24-year-old clocked 1:42.98 to beat Olympic champion Emmanuel Wanyonyi and looks in shape to finally threaten Seb Coe’s long-standing British record in the coming weeks.
June 10 marks the 45th anniversary of Seb Coe’s British 800m record of 1:41.73. Taking place in Florence, Italy in 1981, it has stood the test of time and when it comes to British records in Olympic athletics, only Meg Ritchie’s women’s discus mark is older.
However, the sign is really in jeopardy this summer. Max Burgin was sixth at the world finals in Tokyo last September with a PB of 1:42.29. and on Sunday (May 31) in Rabat, Morocco, he won convincingly in the Diamond League ahead of, among others, Olympic champion Emmanuel Wanyonyi.
Burgin clocked 1:42.98, with Vanyon more than half a second behind in 1:43.56, then a world-class field including Algeria’s Slimane Moula, France’s Gabriel Tual and the United States’ Donavan Brazier were further back.
“It was great conditions,” Burgin said. “I thought I was in good shape and no one was making a decisive move, so I went with the pacemaker and stayed with it.”
When asked about Burgin in December, Coe suggested the young Brit first needed to start winning races.
“He’s very talented and you have to conquer things and with that comes a contagious confidence,” Coe told AW. “I’ve seen it with Jake (Whiteman) and Josh (Kerr) as well.
“You have to get to pole position and sometimes the rest of your career just follows. It’s a psychological breakthrough like anything else.”
As Burgin showed this weekend in Morocco, he has now developed the winning touch at the highest level.
As avid sports fans know, he first showed his talent as a record-setting teenage runner. Among other things, he broke David Sharpe’s long-standing British under-20 record of 1:45.36 in 2019 aged just 17, before taking it to 1:44.75 the following year, just after his 18th birthday. He then ran a time of 1:44.14 at the start of 2021, but missed the rest of the season with injury, something that became a theme in subsequent seasons.
At the 2022 world championships, he missed the starting line and ended up on a mobility scooter after developing a blood clot in his leg. In 2024, however, he battled calf problems to reach the Olympic final, albeit in eighth and final place.
Then in 2025 he ran a great PB of 1:42.36 at the Diamond League in London before improving to 1:42.29 a few weeks later in Tokyo when sixth in the top-class final over Kenyan Wanyon.
Rumors that he has wintered well recently proved true in Rabat and he can now look forward to a season that includes the European Championships and Commonwealth Games on home soil, as well as the final World Athletics Championships in Budapest, all three of which he says he wants to do.
Audrey Verreau impressed in the women’s 800m in Rabat with an equally dominant run. The Swiss athlete beat Ethiopian Tsige Duguma and Kenyan Lilian Odira with a time of 1:56.56.
Matt Hudson-Smith also showed good form as the Briton edged out USA’s Jacory Patterson in 44.11 to 44.25 in the 400m.
In the women’s 100m hurdles, Nigeria’s Tobi Amusan set a record of 12.28 (1.2).
Tina Clayton was also in fast form as she clocked 10.85 (0.3) to win the women’s 100m as Jamaican teammates Lavanya Williams and Joniel Smith secured the top three spots.
Kenny Bednarek was also in fine form as the American clocked a record 19.69 (0.4) to win the men’s 200m from Letsile Tebogo of Botswana.
USA’s Jared Nugus won the 1500m in 3:30.35 as he held off world champion Isaac Nader of Portugal, while Ethiopia’s Frewaini Hailu won the women’s race in 3:58.25 with Britain’s Laura Muir fifth in 4:00.77.
In the field, Joe Kovacs led the USA’s top four in the men’s shot put with a world-leading and record 22.58m.
Australia’s Nina Kennedy won the women’s pole vault with 4.80m, while Great Britain’s Molly Codery finished seventh with 4.60m.
It has become tradition for the men’s race to be played at the end of this match so the crowd can roar at Soufiane El Bakkali. The Moroccan favorite didn’t disappoint either as he cruised to victory in a world-leading 7:57.25, just behind European record holder Frederik Rupert of Germany in 7:57.80.
