The 2010 Diamond League season was the first season of the

Diamond League The Diamond League is an annual series of elite track and field athletic competitions comprising fifteen invitational athletics meetings. The series sits in the top tier of the World Athletics one-day meet competitions. The inaugural season was ...

, an annual series of fourteen one-day

track and field Track and field (or athletics in British English) is a sport that includes Competition#Sports, athletic contests based on running, jumping, and throwing skills. The name used in North America is derived from where the sport takes place, a ru ...

meetings. The series began on 14 May in

Doha Doha ( ) is the capital city and main financial hub of Qatar. Located on the Persian Gulf coast in the east of the country, north of Al Wakrah and south of Al Khor (city), Al Khor and Lusail, it is home to most of the country's population. It ...

Qatar Qatar, officially the State of Qatar, is a country in West Asia. It occupies the Geography of Qatar, Qatar Peninsula on the northeastern coast of the Arabian Peninsula in the Middle East; it shares Qatar–Saudi Arabia border, its sole land b ...

and ended on 27 August in

Brussels Brussels, officially the Brussels-Capital Region, (All text and all but one graphic show the English name as Brussels-Capital Region.) is a Communities, regions and language areas of Belgium#Regions, region of Belgium comprising #Municipalit ...

Belgium Belgium, officially the Kingdom of Belgium, is a country in Northwestern Europe. Situated in a coastal lowland region known as the Low Countries, it is bordered by the Netherlands to the north, Germany to the east, Luxembourg to the southeas ...

. Superseding the European-centred

IAAF Golden League The IAAF Golden League was an annual series of outdoor track and field meetings organised by the International Association of Athletics Federations (IAAF). Athletes who won specific events at all of the series meetings were awarded a jackpot prize ...

, the Diamond League was the

IAAF World Athletics, formerly known as the International Amateur Athletic Federation and International Association of Athletics Federations and formerly abbreviated as the IAAF, is the international sports governing body, governing body for the sport ...

's first intercontinental series of one-day

meetings. Expanding upon the idea of the former Golden League jackpot, there were 32 separate ''Diamond Races'', involving 16 men's and 16 women's track and field events – each of the events featured seven times only over the course of the fourteen meetings of the 2010 Diamond League, and the best athlete in each event won a ''Diamond Trophy''. League winners were decided via a points system, with four points going to the winner, two to the runner-up, and one to the third place finisher, with points doubled at the final two meetings in Brussels and Zurich. The total available prize money for the series was

US$ The United States dollar (Currency symbol, symbol: Dollar sign, $; ISO 4217, currency code: USD) is the official currency of the United States and International use of the U.S. dollar, several other countries. The Coinage Act of 1792 introdu ...

6.63 million.Track and Field’s elite endorse IAAF Diamond League at sparkling launch

(2009-11-21). Retrieved on 2010-01-02. For infrastructure reasons the men's and women's

hammer throw The hammer throw (HT for short) is one of the four throwing events in regular outdoor track-and-field competitions, along with the discus throw, shot put and Javelin throw, javelin. The hammer used in this sport is not like any of the tools a ...

events were not included in the IAAF Diamond League. For this reason the IAAF created a Hammer Throw challenge. For the first time, some of the world's foremost track and field athletes were centrally contracted to an athletics meeting series. For the 2010 series the contracted athletes – called Diamond League Ambassadors – included figures such as

Usain Bolt Usain St. Leo Bolt (; born 21 August 1986) is a Jamaican retired sprinter who is widely regarded as the greatest sprinter of all time. He is an eight-time Olympic gold medalist and the world record holder in the 100 metres, 200 metres, ...

Kenenisa Bekele Kenenisa Bekele Beyecha (; ; born 13 June 1982) is an Ethiopian Long-distance running, long-distance runner. He was the world record holder in both the 5000 metres, 5,000-metre and 10000 metres, 10,000-metre from 2004 until 2020. He won the go ...

Yelena Isinbayeva Yelena Gadzhievna Isinbayeva ( rus, Елена Гаджиевна Исинбаева, p=jɪˈlʲɛnə gɐˈdʐɨjɪvnə ɪsʲɪnˈbajɪvə; born 3 June 1982) is a Russian former pole vaulter. She is twice an Olympic gold medalist (2004 and 200 ...

and

Blanka Vlašić Blanka Vlašić (; born 8 November 1983) is a Croatian former track and field athlete who specialised in the high jump. She is a double world champion, an indoor world champion and twice Olympic medallist. Vlašić's personal best of is a Cr ...

. Prior to the series, former

World Champion A world championship is generally an international competition open to elite competitors from around the world, representing their nations, and winning such an event will be considered the highest or near highest achievement in the sport, game ...

Steve Cram Stephen Cram, (born 14 October 1960) is a British retired track and field athlete. Along with fellow Britons Sebastian Coe and Steve Ovett, he was one of the world's dominant middle-distance runners during the 1980s. Nicknamed "The Jarrow Arro ...

stated that he believed that, through greater

television Television (TV) is a telecommunication medium for transmitting moving images and sound. Additionally, the term can refer to a physical television set rather than the medium of transmission. Television is a mass medium for advertising, ...

exposure, and mutual responsibility between the IAAF and promoters, the 2010 Diamond League would raise the profile of the sport of athletics.

Meeting calendar

Ambassadors

A total of fourteen athletes were given Diamond League Ambassador status, with the intention of bringing attention to some of the sport's foremost competitors. There are seven male and seven female athletes, and the division between track and field specialists is also evenly divided.Five new athlete Ambassadors announced – IAAF Diamond League
.

(2010-04-16). Retrieved on 2010-04-21. Usain Bolt Lightning pose

Winners

Men

Track

In Oslo, Eugene and London, mile races are counted to the Diamond League standings for the 1500m.

Field

Women

Track

In Lausanne and Monaco, 3000m races are counted to the Diamond League standings for the 5000m.

Field

Results

References

;Results
Results Archive
IAAF Diamond League (archived). Retrieved on 2015-05-17.

External links

Official website
*

review of competition
Part 1
{{2010 in athletics

Diamond Diamond is a Allotropes of carbon, solid form of the element carbon with its atoms arranged in a crystal structure called diamond cubic. Diamond is tasteless, odourless, strong, brittle solid, colourless in pure form, a poor conductor of e ...

Diamond League