World Championships: Kenyan teenager Phanuel Koech among men’s 1500m favourites
By Joel Masibo, September 10, 2025Three days until the commencement of the World Athletics Championships Tokyo 25 on Saturday, September 13, 2025, there is still no clear favourite in the men’s 1500m.
This season has been characterised by exceptionally fast racing – a record 14 men have run under 3:30 this year. The race features several winners, such as the Diamond League.
Among those aiming for a podium finish is Kenya’s Phanuel Koech, an 18-year-old middle-distance runner who specialises in the 1500 metres. Koech heads to the Tokyo World Championships as the world U-20 record holder in the event, putting him among the favourites to light up the men’s 1500m event in Japan this month.
Koech won his U20 title in June 2025 at the Meeting de Paris with a time of 3:27.72. This performance also placed him 9th on the senior world all-time list at that time.
Ingebrigtsen’s absence impact
In the absence of the dominant figure in the 1500m for the last four years, Norway’s Jakob Ingebrigtsen, who sustained an Achilles injury early in the year and has missed almost the entire outdoor season, the event has become unpredictable, and the race for the world title shapes up as the most open in years.
Apart from Phanuel Koech, the closest thing to a frontrunner is probably the 20-year-old Dutch athlete Niels Laros, who won the Diamond League Final in Zurich and also had wins in Brussels and Eugene, which boasted one of the deepest fields of the year.
Others dreaming of the podium will include French veteran Azeddine Habz, who has the top time of the year (3:27.49) set at the Paris Diamond League meeting.
Others who have broken 3:30 this year include defending world champion and Olympic silver medallist Josh Kerr (3:29.37), world indoor champion Ingebrigtsen (3:29.63 indoors in February), 2019 world champion Timothy Cheruiyot (3:29.75) and Australian teenager Cameron Myers (3:29.80), so none of them can be discounted.
Olympic champion Cole Hocker has yet to find his best form this year, squeezing into the US team for Tokyo by virtue of a third place at his national championships in August. Portugal’s Isaac Nader won the Dream Mile in Oslo in June and has featured highly in many of the big races this year. All of these athletes have podium potential in Tokyo.