Usain Bolt wins IAAF World Athlete of the Year award for a record sixth time

Usain Bolt and Almaz Ayana pick up their awards from Prince Albert of Monaco (far left) and IAAF president Lord Coe (far right)

NINE-time Olympic champion Usain Bolt has won the IAAF male Athlete of the Year award for a record sixth time.

Ethiopia’s Almaz Ayana, who broke the 10,000m world record by over 14 seconds in winning Olympic gold in Rio this summer, won the female award.

Bolt, 30, sealed the ‘triple triple’ in Rio, winning his third Olympic title in each of the 100m, 200m and 4x100m.

“It’s definitely a big deal,” said the Jamaican of the award he also won in 2008, 2009, 2011, 2012 and 2013.

Bolt will retire next year, following the 2017 World Athletics Championships in London.

He added: “When you get to be athlete of the year it means that all the hard work has paid off, so if I can win it for a sixth year means as much as the first one.”

Ayana, meanwhile, broke a record set 23 years earlier when she clocked 29 minutes 17.45 seconds in Rio.

The 25-year-old also won 5,000m bronze, and won the Diamond Race.

Canada’s Andre de Grasse, the 22-year-old who won 200m silver and 100m bronze in Rio, was named male rising star, while Olympic heptathlon champion Nafissatou Thiam, 22, won the female award.

Harry Marra won the IAAF Coaching Achievement Award after guiding Ashton Eaton to a second Olympic decathlon gold and Brianne Theisen Eaton to heptathlon bronze. bbc.com