It is a scene that has become gloriously familiar down the years. Jakob Ingebrigtsen leaving the world’s best athletes gasping in his slipstream, holding one finger in the air, revelling in his athletic genius. But this victory over 5,000m at the inaugural Ultimate Championships carried extra sweetness – and spice.

The sweetness? That came from winning a mammoth first prize of $150,000. And the spice? Well, that was provided by the way Ingebrigtsen utterly obliterated his great American rival Cole Hocker, a man he had branded a “coward” just a week ago.

Ingebrigtsen, the reigning Olympic 5,000m champion, has never been shy of venturing an opinion, and he was particularly aggrieved when Hocker substituted his own pacemaker in for the 1500m Diamond League final – and then refused to follow him. That led to a high-publicised war of words, and a rematch that was the talk of Budapest.

And, my, it lived up to the hype. The pace was quick, but the Norwegian was so confident he had time to look around twice on the final lap before launching a devastating final kick to win in 12min 59.24sec, with Hocker, the current 5,000m world champion, nearly a second back.

Ingebrigtsen’s time over the final lap was 54.39 seconds, while over the last 100m it was 12.6. And what made the performance so extraordinary was that he feared his career could be over after a serious achilles injury that left him unable to compete for 11 months.

“Being injured I was fearing the worst outcome and did not know if I would be able to run at all especially at this level,” he said. “This is amazing, I am extremely happy.”

There was British success too with Jazmin Sawyers coming second to the Italian Larissa Iapichino in the women’s long jump with a final leap of 6.78m. That capped a fine season for Sawyers, who also won Commonwealth gold and European silver, and it also made her $75,000 (£55,000) richer. There was also a bronze place for the British 4x100m mixed relay team, spearheaded by Success Eduan, as they finished behind the US and Jamaica.

There has been a lot of talk about the $10m prize fund at these Ultimate Championships, but it isn’t just the biggest prizes that matter – as Eduan made clear afterwards.

At some point next week, Eduan will deliver the four babies she requires to complete her BSc in midwifery. But she made clear that her share of the $25,000 prize – around £4,730 – would help her start paying off her student debts.

“I’m finishing hopefully next week,” she said. “I still have one more placement. Unfortunately I didn’t get my births two weeks ago, so I’m just going to get on my births now. I’ve got four more left to deliver, I arrive in Manchester on Monday afternoon, and I have a Monday night shift that day. Three nights, so I finish on Thursday morning.”

She is confident she will hit her target. “September’s usually a crazy month for babies,” she said, smiling.

There are still two days to go at these championships, but this was an encouraging start. It was faster paced than the recent European championships. It also looked the part with a black infield and bright lights. There were plenty of impressive performances, with Mondo Duplantis’s 6.25m leap to win the pole vault one of the standouts.

Elsewhere Keely Hodgkinson also made an impressive return in his first run back to win her semi-final in 1:57.57 before delivering her trademark clap. She was so far ahead of her rivals that she was not affected when the Swiss athlete Veronica Vancardo suffered a hard fall in the home straight.

“This season we have had a fair share of people falling over unfortunately,” said Hodgkinson. “She still got all her teeth, so she will be OK. Unfortunately it happens. It’s one of my worst nightmares. Touch wood, it hasn’t happened to me so far.”

Hodgkinson, who watched as her two main rivals Audrey Werro and Femke Broeders-Bol finished first and second in the second semi-final, also pronounced herself happy with her performance

“I am happy with that. Glad to be back and running. It was a lot of fun, it looks amazing. We will come back and hopefully do better.”

On the downside, it was cold. Cold enough, in fact, that the Ukraine high jumper Yaroslava Mahuchikh wore sleeping bags between her jumps. Not that it unduly bothered her as she took victory in 1.99m.