The awards season is in full swing and it has been a weekend of celebration for two of European Athletics’ comeback stars - Great Britain’s Jessica Ennis-Hill and Zuzana Hejnova, of the Czech Republic.
The pair were both honoured after a year where they returned to the sport and rose to the top once again.
Hejnova showed what a class act she is by retaining her world 400m hurdles crown after battling back from injury in 2014.
It was a success which led to her being named the Czech Athlete of the Year in a glittering ceremony broadcast live on television.
After running the 800m and 4x400m relay in Prague in March, as she eased her way back into the championships, Hejnova was at her best by the outdoor season where she won gold in Beijing with a world-leading 53.50 as she beat Americans Shamier Little (53.94) and Cassandra Tate (54.02).
As in 2013, when she was world champion in Moscow, Hejnova was also the dominant force in the IAAF Diamond League as she won the Diamond Race.
Hejnova won the voting with 1357 points but it was very much a gold-medal celebration from the European Athletics Indoor Championships as Jakub Holusa, who won the 1500m title in Prague, was second with 1063 and Pavel Maslak, who retained his 400m crown, was third with 934.
The Hejnova success was not over, either, because her mentor Dalibor Kupka was named Coach of the Year.
Long jumper Radek Juska, 22, won the Newcomer of the Year after a 2015 where he took silver both in Prague (8.10m) and then at the European Athletics U23 Championships in Tallinn (8.00m).
The Czech Republic’s Junior of the Year is high jumper Michaela Hruba, 17, who won gold at the World Youth Championships in Cali (1.90m).
On Friday night in London, Ennis-Hill was named the Sunday Times and Sky Sports Sportswoman of the Year after a summer where she won the world heptathlon title for the second time, 13 months on from giving birth to her first child, son Reggie.
It is also the second occasion she has won this award, the first being in 2012 when she was crowned Olympic champion, a gold medal she cannot wait to defend in Rio next summer.
Talking to this week’s Sunday Times, Ennis-Hill, 29, said: 'I'm really proud that I got back into my sport. It was hard but I thought if I didn't give it a go, Reggie would say 'Why didn't you do it, Mum? You could have gone to the Olympics'. I didn't want to have that feeling.'
Ennis-Hill triumphed in Beijing in August with 6669 points, winning by 115 from Canada’s Brianne Theissen-Eaton.
She was not the only British sprinter to be rewarded for her exploits in the Bird’s Nest Stadium as sprinter printer Dina Asher-Smith, 19, was named the Young Sportswoman of the Year.
After a winter where she won silver in a national 60m record (7.08) behind Dafne Schippers (7.05) at the European Athletics Indoor Championships in Prague, Asher-Smith broke British records at the 100m and 200m in the summer.
The latter was not just a record, but a landmark moment when she finished fifth in the final in Beijing in 22.07 because her time finally eclipsed the 22.10 which Kathy Cook had run at the Olympic Games in Los Angeles in 1984.