Jamaican sprint legend Shelly-Ann Fraser-Pryce won her fifth Diamond League title as she defied age and injury to make history yet again in 2022.
When Shelly-Ann Fraser-Pryce launched her Diamond League campaign in Eugene earlier this year, it had been seven long years since her last series title. Yet class is permanent, and in 2022, the 35-year-old showed once again that age is no barrier as she tore up the circuit on her way to a fifth Diamond Trophy.
Fraser-Pryce's return to world-beating form had already been visible last season as she set a new personal best of 10.60 in Lausanne, but she had remained half a stride behind her compatriot Elaine Thompson-Herah, who swept to the 100m Diamond League title with a series of meeting records in 2021.
Not so in 2022, as Fraser-Pryce restored her grip on the Diamond Trophy with an astonishing string of victories and records between June and September. Not since the mid-2010s, when she notched up four titles in four seasons (including a 100m and 200m double in 2013), had the Jamaican been quite so dominant in the Diamond League.
In terms of points, the "Pocket Rocket" began the season on the back foot. Despite an early world lead of 10.67 in Kenya and victory in the non-scoring 200m in Eugene, she found herself lagging behind Thompson-Herah in the qualification standings after missing the first few Diamond League meetings of the year in the 100m.
That all changed in Paris, with Fraser-Pryce once again clocking 10.67 to break the meeting record in the Stade Charlety and open her 2022 Diamond League account in style.
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Victory in France proved to be the starting gun for a searing run of form, which eventually saw her crowned world champion for a record fifth time at the World Athletics Championships in Eugene in July.
Yet the Jamaican did not let up after securing major championship gold. On her return to the Diamond League circuit in August, she ran 10.66 to smash the Silesia meeting record and set a new world lead, hurling down the gauntlet to Thompson-Herah and fellow in-form Jamaican Shericka Jackson.
By the time she arrived in Monaco in mid-August, she was firing on all cylinders, and she locked down her place in the Diamond League Final with a staggering 10.62, breaking yet another meeting record in the process.
Whispers were already abounding of a possible world record when she arrived in Lausanne a week later, the same city in which she had run 10.60 the previous year. Just hours before she as set to race, however, disaster struck. A muscle injury in the warm-up forced Fraser-Pryce to pull out at the last minute, leaving both her world record and her title hopes hanging by a thread.
The Jamaican later admitted that she had been close to ending her season there and then, but the knock proved to be less serious than some had feared, and she battled on to race at both Brussels and the Diamond League Final in Zurich.
She had to make do with second place in Brussels, but still made headlines by challenging Swedish pole vault star Mondo Duplantis to a 100m head-to-head in 2023.
Her winning time of 10.65 in Switzerland was still a fair way off the world record, but it wasmore than enough to grab another meeting record, a fifth title and a first Diamond Trophy since 2015.
And Fraser-Pryce already has her sights set on even bigger goals for next year. As well as beating Duplantis and defending her title, she has also insisted a world record is possible in 2023.