The 400 metres hurdles is a track and field hurdling event. The event has been on the Olympic athletics programme since 1900 for men and since 1984 for women.
Zuzana Hejnová is a retired Czech athlete who specialised in the 400 metres hurdles. She won the silver medal in the event at the 2012 London Olympics. Hejnová is a two-time World Champion, having claimed titles at the 2013 and 2015 World Championships in Athletics. She won bronze at the 2012 European Championships and silver for the 400 metres at the 2017 European Indoor Championships.
Eilidh Doyle is a retired British track and field athlete. Originally running as Eilidh Child, she specialised in the 400 metres hurdles outdoors, and the 400 metres flat indoors, as well as the 4 x 400 metres relay on both surfaces. She represented Great Britain at the 2012 Olympic Games in London, and won an Olympic bronze medal in the 4 x 400 metres relay at the 2016 Games in Rio de Janeiro. Individually, she is the 2014 European Champion and a three-time Commonwealth silver medalist in the 400 metres hurdles.
Léa Sprunger is a Swiss former track and field athlete. Originally a heptathlete like her older sister Ellen, she began concentrating on the 200 metres and 400 metres in 2011, and then on the 400 metres hurdles from 2015. Her best times in the 400m and 400m hurdles of 50.52 s (2018) and 54.06 s (2019) are the Swiss records. She finished fifth in the 400m hurdles final at the 2017 World Championships, and went on to win the gold medal in the 400m hurdles at the 2018 European Championships.
Karsten Warholm is a Norwegian sprinter who competes in the 400 metres and 400 m hurdles. He is the 2020 Tokyo Olympic champion, silver medalist at the 2024 Paris Olympics, three-time world champion and world record holder in the latter event.
Wenda Nel is a South African athlete specialising in the 400 metres hurdles. She competed at the 2011 World Championships reaching the semifinals.
Janieve Russell is a Jamaican track and field athlete who competes mainly in the 400 metres hurdles and the 400 metres sprint. She won an Olympic bronze medal in the 4 × 400 m relay in Tokyo 2021, where she also finished fourth in the 400m hurdles final in a personal best of 53.08 secs. She is a four-time Commonwealth Games gold medallist, winning the 400m hurdles title in 2018 and 2022, and the 4 × 400 m relay in 2014 and 2018. She has also won two relay silvers at the World Championships and a relay gold at the World Indoor Championships.
Thomas Barr is an Irish track and field athlete who competes in the sprints and hurdles. He is probably best known for being a member of the winning European Championship Mixed 4x400 Relay team.
The men's 400 metres hurdles event at the 1994 World Junior Championships in Athletics was held in Lisbon, Portugal, at Estádio Universitário de Lisboa on 20, 21 and 22 July.
Kendra "Keni" Harrison is an American hurdler. Harrison held the world record in the women's 100 metres hurdles with a time of 12.20 seconds, set on July 22, 2016 at the London Müller Anniversary Games, breaking the previous world record of 12.21 seconds achieved nearly 28 years earlier by Bulgarian athlete Yordanka Donkova.
Shamier Little is an American track and field sprinter specializing in the 400 metres hurdles. As a 20-year-old college sophomore at Texas A&M University, Little was the 2015 US champion. She then went on to win the silver medal in her signature event at the 2015 and 2023 World Championships. In July 2021, she became the fifth fastest woman of all time at the event.
Nicholas Kiplagat Bett was a Kenyan track and field athlete who competed in the 400 metres hurdles. His personal best for the event is 47.79 seconds. He was a world champion in the event, having won in 2015, and a two-time bronze medallist at the African Championships in Athletics. He died in a road accident in Kenya at the age of 28.
Ristananna Bailey-Cole is a Jamaican athlete specialising in the 400 metres hurdles. She represented her country at three consecutive World Championships reaching the semifinals in 2011 and 2013. She placed fifth at the 2016 Olympics. She made her best run to date at the IAAF World Championships in London on August 10, 2017, finishing with the bronze medal in a personal best 53.74.
Ayomide Temilade Oluwatoyosi Folorunso is an Italian athlete specialising in the 400 metres hurdles. She competed in the 4 × 400 metres relay at the 2015 World Championships in Beijing.
Katrina Seymour is a Bahamian athlete competing in the 400 metres and 400 metres hurdles. She competed in the 4 × 400 metres relay at the 2009 and 2015 World Championships without qualifying for the final.
Aron Kipchumba Koech is a Kenyan hurdler. At the 2015 Athletics Kenya World Championship Trials he finished third in the 400 metres hurdles event. Later that year he represented Kenya in the 400 metres hurdles event at the 2015 World Championships in Athletics in Beijing, China. With a personal best, in a time of 49.38, he finished 22nd in the heats. He was qualified for the semi-finals where he finished 19th in a time of 49.54. Again in 2016 he finished third at the 2016 Athletics Kenya Olympic Trials behind his brother and Boniface Mucheru Tumuti. At the Olympics, Koech made the final while his brother was disqualified in the heats. Tumuti went on to capture the silver medal in National Record time, while Koech finished seventh. His 48.49 in the semi-final round is his personal record.
Abderrahman Almoubarrake Samba Alsaleck is a Qatari male track and field athlete who specialises in the 400 metres hurdles. He was born and raised in Saudi Arabia but chose to represent Mauritania – his father's homeland – before eventually switching allegiance to Qatar and moving to Doha in 2015. He became eligible to compete for his adopted country in May 2016. He was the second person to run the 400m hurdle event in less than 47 seconds.
Rai Benjamin is an American hurdler and sprinter specializing in the 400 m and 400 m hurdles. He is the second fastest man in history in the 400 m hurdles with a personal best time of 46.17 s. He won a silver medal at his first Olympic Games in 2021 and won the 400 m hurdles race at the 2024 Summer Olympics. Benjamin also won silver medals and at the World Championships in 2019 and 2022 in the men's 400 m hurdles, and gold medals in the 4 × 400 m relay in 2019 and 2021.
Kenneth Selmon is an American track and field athlete who specializes in the 400 metres hurdles. He won the USA Outdoor Championship in 2018 and represented his country at the 2018 Athletics World Cup in London, where he won the 400 metres hurdles.
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