Coe 'blown away' by brilliant women's 1500m

EUGENE, Ore. : Sebastian Coe, the head of world athletics and twice Olympic champion over the distance, described the women's world 1,500 metres final won by Kenyan Faith Kipyegon on Monday as one of the best races he has ever seen.

Kipyegon, also a double Olympic metric mile champion, along with Ethiopian Gudaf Tsegay and Briton Laura Muir, set an astonishing pace from the gun and barely let up before the Kenyan forged clear to win in a fleet three minutes, 52.96 seconds.

Tsegay took second and Muir finally bagged a world medal after finishing fifth, fourth and fifth in the previous three 1,500m world finals.

"That was one of the best races I've ever seen, I was blown away, I sat there trying to pinch myself," Coe told journalists on Tuesday.

"At one point I figured out that it was still on world record base for 800 at about 575. I looked at the first lap at 51.1 seconds and I am thinking 'what?!'"

"I have to say it was a really interesting race because for Tsegay to decide that she's going to burn Kipyegon off at the beginning that's not really going to happen. The biggest call was Laura deciding 'do I stay with this pace?'"

"She was brave. Her decision to actually go toe to toe and be in the mix right the way through - it was one of the great performances."

Absent from the field on Monday was South African Caster Semenya, who is not permitted to race distances from 400m to a mile under World Athletics' differences of sexual development (DSD) rule which tries to rule out those with an "unfair" level of testosterone from racing in women's races.

Semenya, 31, will line up in the 5,000m heats on Wednesday 13 years after she came to the world's attention - and sparked a still-running debate about DSD athletes - by winning 800m