1997 World Championships in Athletics

The 6th World Championships in Athletics, under the auspices of the International Amateur Athletic Federation, were held at the Olympic Stadium, Athens, Greece between August 1 and August 10, 1997. In this event participated 1882 athletes from 198 participant nations. Despite several attempts to sabotage,Athens used the successful organization of the World Championships to prove their capacity during the next IOC Session held the following month in Lausanne as a triumph and key event during the final stretch of the process to choose the city who hosted 2004 Summer Olympics. The success of the event showed the Greece abilities and readiness to organize large-scale, international sporting events.

It was the first edition to award wild cards to defending champions even if they did not qualify for their national team. This allowed four athletes from the same country to compete in an individual event in some cases.

Track
1993 | 1995 | 1997 | 1999 | 2001 Note: * Indicates athletes who ran in preliminary rounds.
 * The United States (Jerome Young, Antonio Pettigrew, Chris Jones, and Tyree Washington) originally won the 4 × 400 m relay in 2:56.47, but were disqualified in 2009 after Antonio Pettigrew admitted to using HGH and EPO between 1997 and 2003.

Field
1993 | 1995 | 1997 | 1999 | 2001
 * Aleksandr Bagach of Ukraine originally won the shot put with 21.47 m, but was disqualified after he tested positive for steroids.

Track
1993 | 1995 | 1997 | 1999 | 2001 Note: * Indicates athletes who ran in preliminary rounds.

Field
1993 | 1995 | 1997 | 1999 | 2001