Duplantis, second athlete to receive Laureus Award for Best Sportsman

Swedish athlete Armand Duplantis, world champion and pole vault record holder (6.27 metres), was honoured on Monday with the Laureus Award for Best Sportsman of 2024, ahead of Carlos Alcaraz, Tadej Pogacar, Léon Marchand, and Max Verstappen. Mondo Duplantis is the second athlete to win the "Oscar of sports," following Usain Bolt, in a list of stars usually dominated by tennis players for the past quarter-century.

After breaking the pole vault world record eleven times and becoming the Olympic, indoor world, and European champion last year, the current star of athletics was the favourite to succeed Novak Djokovic, who has been awarded five times, in the Laureus honours. "This award is an honour. I wouldn't be here now if it weren't for the people who have inspired me," Duplantis emphasised at the Palacio de Cibeles in Madrid, which hosted the world's major sports gala for the second consecutive year.

Alcaraz, who won the Laureus Breakthrough of the Year award in 2023, was in contention for the 2025 Best Sportsman award but had to concede to the greatest pole vaulter of all time, as did the other nominees.

The predictions also came true for Real Madrid, as the best team of the year, and Lamine Yamal, as the breakthrough athlete.