With the book closed on the 2025 track and field season at last, it’s time to start looking back on the year as a whole. Sure, it’s still October, but with any December time trial meets really counting toward the start of the 2026 indoor season, it feels like an appropriate time for some reflection.

We’re not the only ones getting a jump on navel-gazing, either. World Athletics has begun rolling out its nominees for its end-of-year awards, beginning with the finalists for Track Athlete of the Year and Field Athlete of the Year. At least one of those awards won’t be much of a competition at all. (Where does Mondo even put the trophies at this point? And Valarie Allman has a pretty strong case that she’s been more dominant over the discus than ever before.)

The men’s track nominees are particularly interesting because no one has really had an unblemished campaign. Four of the five nominees got beat a few times in their primary event, even if the year ended with a World title. Noah Lyles probably has the best shot at reclaiming this award after losing out to Letsile Tebogo last year as he’s unquestionably the best 200m runner this season. But Lyles didn’t pull off the same triple he did to claim the crown in 2023. Weirdly—although perhaps suitably for a 2025 season that could be very hard to predict at times—this race feels wide open because nobody has been truly extraordinary.

The women’s competition has the exact opposite problem. The athlete with the most memorable performance from this year’s World Championships, Sydney McLaughlin-Levrone (ever heard of her?), has arguably the fourth most compelling resume among the five nominees. Sure, you became the first athlete in 40 years under 48 seconds in the 400m, but that’s simply not good enough, kid. Even Faith Kipyegon’s seventh global 1500m gold and third world record probably won’t be enough to land her atop the voting.

That’s because two athletes—Beatrice Chebet and Melissa Jefferson-Wooden—have run fast and won repeatedly this year. Both women were untouchable from start to finish in 2025. In addition to coming home from Tokyo with a hefty medal haul, they raced early and often, something the folks in charge of organizing all those races presumably appreciate.

The challenge in narrowing things down from finalists to winners (which is a combination of World Athletics voting and popular voting) is comparing speedy apples to distance-y oranges. Chebet and Jefferson-Wooden were dominant at opposite ends of the track spectrum… so how do you decide who’s better? As a voter—which, as a member of the social media-having public, you are—you’ve gotta choose one.

First, a quick resume refresher:

Beatrice Chebet: World 5000m and 10,000m champion; 13:58.06 5000m world record; 8:11.56 #3 all-time 3000m; 3:54.73 1500m; beat reigning World 5000m champ Faith Kipyegon and World 10,000m champ Gudaf Tsegay head-to-head.

Melissa Jefferson-Wooden: World 100m, 200m, 4x100m champ; season’s bests of 10.61 (#4 all-time) and 21.68 (#8 all-time); undefeated in 100m and 13 for 14 in individual races overall; beat Olympic 100m champ Julien Alfred head-to-head twice.

Aren’t we lucky to be living in a time with both these women on the track? Talk about an embarrassment of riches.

In some ways, the question could come down to whether you weigh Chebet’s barrier-breaking sub-14 run heavier than MJW’s relay gold. But there are other factors to consider as well: Chebet has been fantastic, but also relatively consistent to her 2024 form, whereas Jefferson-Wooden has noticeably stepped up her game this season. Chebet hasn’t won this award yet despite being a two-time World XC and double Olympic champ, so arguably she’s due. And opinions vary on how much to consider distance times in the trackflation world, particularly when Jefferson-Wooden is being measured against mythical 1980s FloJo marks.

There’s also the question of who will win vs. who should win.

Historically, the Athlete of the Year award has skewed toward sprinters, like in 2013, when Shelly-Ann Fraser-Pryce won for the same triple-feat Melissa just pulled off. The 2023 revamp of the awards system to consider track, field, and “out of stadium” performances in three separate categories helps expand the shine a little, but that still ends with 10,000m runners going head-to-head with indoor 60m specialists. The last comparable long-distance winner was Almaz Ayana, whose world-record setting 10,000m at the Rio Olympics was a mind-boggling performance at the time (Faith Kipyegon and Eliud Kipchoge have also won in recent years but aren’t purely long distance track specialists).

The popular vote and the “World Athletics Family” vote (a group of current and former pro athletes and other influential figures) each count for 25 percent of the overall voting, each of which could lead to regional bases of support from the U.S. and East Africa. But each could end up with a split vote of her own as there are two American nominees and two Kenyan nominees, so it may be a bit of a wash. Ultimately, the shadowy entity known as the “World Athletics Council” will likely get the final say—and who knows what they value most?

For us here at the Lap Count, the decision comes down to ~vibes~. Chebet’s two-year run atop the distance ranks has truly been remarkable, particularly as she’s repeatedly beaten a just-as-lethal Kipyegon two championships in a row. But 2025 really was the Year of Melissa, and there’s something to be said for recognizing not just accomplishment, but ascendence. Nobody likes a tie—least of all track and field fans—but this year’s Athlete of the Year is absolutely a photo finish, and it may come down to the thousandth on the metaphorical FAT photo to crown a victor.

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