European Athletics sets £3m prize fund and top-eight payouts for 2028 championships

European Athletics will offer a record prize fund worth about £3m at its 2028 championships in Silesia, Poland, with payments extending to the top eight finishers in every event. BBC Sport reported that the governing body has revised its reward system to give athletes across all 50 disciplines access to the same finishing-position payouts, replacing the bonus arrangement used in Birmingham this year.

Under the new structure, gold medallists will receive 30,000 euros, with 15,000 euros for silver and 10,000 euros for bronze. Fourth place will earn 5,000 euros, followed by 4,000 for fifth, 3,000 for sixth, 2,000 for seventh and 1,000 for eighth. The awards therefore extend beyond the podium, with a published payment for each of the eight places in every discipline.

That is a substantial departure from the August championships in Birmingham, where the 500,000-euro prize pool was not distributed through standard payments for medal positions. Instead, organisers awarded 50,000-euro Gold Crown bonuses for the leading performances in 10 categories, divided equally between men and women. Those performances were assessed using the World Athletics scoring tables rather than a uniform medal-by-medal payment schedule.

The British team’s results illustrated the distinction between winning titles and qualifying for those bonuses. Great Britain and Northern Ireland collected 19 medals in Birmingham, including nine golds, but none of the gold-medal performances earned a Gold Crown award, according to BBC Sport. In 2028, first place in every discipline will carry the stated winner’s payment, without depending on that separate performance ranking.

European Athletics said the revised system was intended to recognise all top-eight finishers and treat disciplines equally. Chief executive Christian Milz presented the record fund as part of the organisation’s commitment to supporting competitors. The announcement follows World Athletics’ recent Ultimate Championship in Budapest, where a $10m overall prize pool included $150,000 for each individual event winner.

The Silesia championships are scheduled for early June 2028, starting six weeks before the Los Angeles Olympics. Another Ultimate Championship and a Diamond League season are also on the calendar that year. Against that schedule, the European event will now offer athletes a defined scale of financial rewards for finishing among the leading eight, rather than reserving its prize money for a smaller set of specially ranked performances.