Emmanuel Korir gave Kenya her second gold medal at the World Athletics Championships in Eugene, Oregon when he whizzed past Canadian Marco Arop to win the men’s 800m.

The Olympic champion Korir has not been in his best form this season but he knew exactly what to do as he breezed past the rest of the field to give Kenya the long-awaited gold in what has admittedly been an underwhelming performance at the Worlds.

Korir had not run above 1:45 in the season but his impressive 400m speed enabled him to take gold in 1:43.71.

Canadian Arop led from the gun and looked likely to cause an upset at the Oregon sunset but Korir just as he did at the Tokyo Olympics timed perfectly and sped past Arop in the 100m stretch. Djamel Sedtaji of Algeria also overtook Arop just before the finish line to claim silver in 1:44.14 with Arop claiming bronze in 1:44.28.

17-year-old Emmanuel Wanyonyi who ran most of the race from behind came in fourth in a time of 1:44.54. Wycliffe Kimanyal finished a distance 8th in 1:47.07.