World athletics has a new major date marked in red on the calendar. From September 11 to 13<\/strong>, Budapest will host the inaugural World Athletics Ultimate Championship<\/strong>, a competition completely different from a World Championship or the Olympic Games and designed to bring together only the best athletes on the planet in 28 selected events<\/strong>.<\/p>\n It will, in a sense, be a grand Diamond League final turned into a championship<\/strong>: three days, only in the afternoon, with no qualifying rounds and an extraordinary concentration of stars. The lineup will feature Paris 2024 Olympic champions, Tokyo 2025 World champions, winners of the 2026 Diamond League final, and athletes invited by world ranking<\/strong>.<\/p>\n Three Afternoons to Decide Who Is the Best<\/p>\n The format is one of the great appeals of the Ultimate Championship. There will be no morning sessions or endless days<\/strong>: all the competition is concentrated in three sessions of about three hours, with semifinals and finals. The 1500m and 5000m events, as well as the relays, will be straight finals, while the field events will also have only finals.<\/p>\n The philosophy of the Ultimate Championship is very clear: it is not an open championship to any athlete who has met a minimum<\/strong>, but an exclusive gathering of the global elite. Individual invitations are initially granted to the Paris 2024 Olympic champions, Tokyo 2025 World champions, and winners of the 2026 Diamond League final<\/strong>. The remaining spots are filled based on the world ranking<\/strong>, once the qualification period closes on September 1.<\/p>\n The number of spots depends on the event: 16 athletes in track events up to 800 meters, 12 in 1500 and 5000, and eight in the field events<\/strong>. Moreover, unlike other major competitions, there is no limit of athletes per country in the individual events<\/strong>, so there could be several representatives from the same nation in a single discipline.<\/p>\n And the financial incentive matches the format. The Ultimate Championship will distribute 10 million dollars<\/strong>, the largest prize ever offered in a single athletics competition, with 150,000 dollars for each champion<\/strong>.<\/p>\n How Many Spaniards Will Be in Budapest?<\/p>\n Pending finalization of the qualification, it is not yet known how many Spanish athletes will compete in Budapest<\/strong>. At the moment, Spain would have within the championship Ja\u00ebl Bestu\u00e9 in the 200 meters,<\/strong> Mohamed Attaoui in the 800 meters, Marta Garc\u00eda in the 5000, and Quique Llopis in the 110 meters hurdles<\/strong>, in addition to the two mixed relays.<\/p>\n The definitive list will not be known until early September. On September 3<\/strong> provisional lists are scheduled to be published and, after the Diamond League final, the remaining spots will be allocated. The final list is expected on September 7<\/strong>, just four days before the championship begins.<\/p>\nThe Best Among the Best<\/h2>\n