The World Was Not Enough: Mondo smashes pole vault, F1 thrills and golf’s Green Jacket surprise | More sports News
A track and field world record broken almost at will by a generational athlete.A tennis star returning from a doping ban to take his place in a duopoly that has more than reassured fans who’ve been fretting over what the sport might look like in a post ‘Big 3′ world.Go Beyond The Boundary with our YouTube channel. SUBSCRIBE NOW!A champion golfer finally adding the only missing piece in his career Grand Slam puzzle in dramatic circumstances.A three-way tussle for the Formula One drivers’ title that went down to the wire and saw a new champion being crowned. 2025, it is safe to say, didn’t leave sports fans disappointed.
How could it, looking at the protagonists at play! Mondo Duplantis, Sydney McLaughlin-Levrone, Jannik Sinner, Carlos Alcaraz, Rory McIlroy, Lando Norris all flourished on the big stage, making what they do a riveting watch for millions who were tuned in.If 2024 witnessed a passing-of-the-torch moment in men’s tennis, with Sinner and Alcaraz splitting the four Grand Slams equally, 2025 showed us that the ‘New Two’ (Jim Courier came up with that one) are here to stay.This year, not only did the Italian and Spaniard share the Majors again, they clashed in the title round of three of them, with their meeting at Roland Garros turning into an all-time classic.
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Which sports moment from 2025 was the most thrilling?
Context always matters in appreciating the magnitude of defining sporting moments. Sinner had only just returned to competitive action a few weeks ahead of the French Open after serving a three-month doping ban that many fellow pros on the ATP and WTA circuit dismissed as an all-too convenient suspension. Remarkably, none of this had any detrimental effect on his game.When Roland Garros bid an emotional farewell to its most decorated champion, Rafael Nadal, at Court Philippe Chatrier, with Roger Federer, Novak Djokovic and Andy Murray all in attendance, it was always going to take something epic to match that event.Sinner and Alcaraz produced a tribute of their own to the retired King of Clay. A five hour, 29 minute blockbuster — the longest French Open men’s final in the Open Era — ultimately going the Spaniard’s way after fighting off three Sinner championship points at 5-3, 0-40 in the fourth set.What makes the ‘SinCaraz’ rivalry so captivating is not just their extraordinary tennis ability but the warm camaraderie they share, much like one saw with Federer and Nadal.It was a big year for track and field, a world championships season, the kind of setting that seems to launch Duplantis into a galaxy of his own. The undisputed king of men’s pole vault broke his own world record — not once, not twice, but four times, the last of those coming at the worlds in Tokyo where he also became an Olympic champion for the first time in 2021. Only, unlike four years ago, this time there was an electrifying 53,000-strong crowd present to appreciate his genius. At last month’s World Athletics Awards in Monaco, the Swede told this newspaper he would love to compete in India, maybe even try to break the world record on these shores. Let’s keep our fingers crossed.McLaughlin-Levrone needed a challenge of a different kind. Having done it all in her pet 400m hurdles, 2025 was about “stepping outside of the comfort zone” and testing her capability in the 400m flat. Tokyo left no room for any doubt as the American ran the second fastest 400m of all time to become the first athlete ever to win world titles in both the 400m flat and 400m hurdles.In golf, McIlroy’s dramatic Masters triumph at Augusta National was another glowing example of everything that makes watching sport such a compelling experience. When he rolled in that three-foot putt to edge Justin Rose in a sudden-death play-off, you could see what it meant to a man who had just ended a 14-year pursuit of that famed Green Jacket.Raw emotion was also on full display when Norris held his nerve at the season-ending Abu Dhabi Grand Prix to cross the finish in third. It was enough for the Briton to seal his maiden Formula 1 drivers’ championship. A championship that, for large parts of the season, seemed to be going the way of Norris’s McLaren teammate Oscar Piastri.Then you had Max Verstappen, the four-time reigning champion. How can one ever rule him out! The Red Bull driver played his part, reviving his challenge for a fifth straight title by winning six of the last nine races, including the final three. Too little? No way, but certainly too late as Norris’s overall consistency proved decisive, by a mere two points!The margins in elite sport are that fine. Ask Sinner, or McIlroy. Ask Norris or Verstappen. Fortune tends to have its say too. Ask Tyrese Haliburton, Indiana Pacers’s star guard, whose brave attempt to play through a strained calf in a gripping NBA Finals showdown with Oklahoma City Thunder took its toll early in game seven. Shai Gilgeous-Alexander and the Thunder made sure to capitalize.It’s why the drama and debate born out of such moments is often not just something we reminisce about at the end of the year, but for years to come.Bring on 2026!THE DEPARTEDRemembering the sports stars we lost in 2025Amid the compelling action, the sporting world also mourned the loss of several iconic figures in 2025. The ageless Indian-born marathoner Fauja Singh was tragically killed in a hit and run incident in Punjab in July. Born in Beas Pind, near Jallandhar, in British India around 1911, when births were not commonly registered, at the time of his death, various sources reported his age at 114 years.• Liverpool and Portuguese footballer Diogo Jota and his brother Andre Silva tragically died in a car collision in July while Suleiman al-Obeid, fondly known as the ‘Palestinian Pele’, was killed in an Israeli attack while reportedly waiting for humanitarian aid in Gaza.• Boxing suffered a double blow, losing two-time heavyweight champion and Olympic gold medallist George Foreman in March and former world champion Ricky Hatton who was found dead at his home in Manchester in Sept. • Chess mourned the passing of its 10th world champion, Russian grandmaster Boris Spassky who was 88 while cricket was left pained by the loss of one of its most loved umpires in England’s Dickie Bird.
