Prize bonuses of USD 20,000 and wildcard entries for the World Athletics Indoor Championships Nanjing 2020 will be on offer for the winners of the 2020 World Athletics Indoor Tour, which begins next month.
The fifth edition of the indoor tour will kick off in Boston (USA) on January 25, with stops in Karlsruhe (Germany) on January 31, Dusseldorf (Germany) on February 4, Torun (Poland) on February 8, Glasgow (UK) on February 15, before taking in the newest addition to the circuit, Lievin (France) on February 19. The final meeting on the World Athletics Indoor Tour will be held in Madrid (Spain) on February 21.
The tour will feature 11 point-scoring disciplines (those that were not part of this year's tour program), six for men - 60m, 800m, 3000m/5000m, pole vault, triple jump and shot put - and five for women - 400m, 1500m, 60m hurdles, high jump, long jump.
Each athlete's best three results will count towards their point score and the athlete with the most points in each discipline at the end of the tour will be declared the winner at the finale in Madrid and receive the USD 20,000 bonus. The winners of each individual event will receive USD 3,000 with the tour offering a combined prize purse of USD 5,70,350.
The tour winners will also be eligible for wildcard entry to the World Athletics Indoor Championships Nanjing 2020, subject to the approval of their national federation.
"The 2020 World Athletics Indoor Tour will be the first one-day meeting series to be held under our new banner and will kick off an exciting and groundbreaking year for track and field," said World Athletics president Sebastian Coe in an official statement."We will take the World Indoor Championships to China for the first time, and launch the Continental Tour which will create new opportunities for our athletes to compete internationally on the way to the Tokyo 2020 Olympic Games," he added.
The individual discipline winners of the 2019 World Indoor Tour included the likes of triple jumper Yulimar Rojas and pole vaulter Anzhelika Sidorova, both of whom went on to win the world titles in Doha. Many other medallists from Doha, including world champions Donavan Brazier, Sam Kendricks, and Tajay Gayle, appeared on the 2019 World Indoor Tour.
Kendricks has already confirmed his appearance in Dusseldorf, where he will clash with the two other medallists from the World Championships, Armand Duplantis and Piotr Lisek. Duplantis and Lisek have also been named in the pole vault field for Torun.
British stars Katarina Johnson-Thompson and Laura Muir are set to compete in Glasgow, while world long jump champion Malaika Mihambo and pole vault world record-holder Renaud Lavillenie are among the star attractions in Karlsruhe. Sydney McLaughlin and Emma Coburn are heading to Boston and Brianna McNeal and Amel Tuka are confirmed for Lievin.
( With inputs from ANI )