After taking a break to have a baby, that is.

A day that had begun with Russian gold in the women's 20 kilometres walk ended with another home success as the 31-year-old returned, like a queen to her court, and made real the fantasy that every supporter had carried into this cavernous stadium, seeing off the women who had taken gold and silver at the London 2012 Olympics - Jenn Suhr of the United States and Yarisley Silva of Cuba - with a single vault over 4.89 metres which proved too much for her rivals.

At the end, just as she had done at the 2008 Beijing Games where she earned her second Olympic title, she had the whole adoring stadium to herself as she made three unsuccessful attempts at 5.07m, one centimetre higher than her own world record.

All opponents vanquished, all eyes on her - the World Championships had become the Yelena Isinbayeva Games.

Yelena Isinbayeva celebrates with her adoring public in Moscow after winning the world pole vault title for the third time in her career

"I would say that I am not retiring. I just take a little women's break to have a baby and then I will try and come back for Rio," she said.

"The whole path between Athens and Beijing wasn't so hard for me like it was now - I won all competitions, I set world records, I didn't know what a defeat is.

"So this medal today is the dearest one to me, because after Beijing I had so many problems.

"This has shown people that the era of Yelena Isinbayeva is here again.

"It was never over."

Mohammed Aman's reputation was already huge - at 19, he arrived in the Russian capital as world indoor champion, and, more particularly, the only athlete to have beaten Kenya's Olympic champion and world record holder David Rudisha in the past two years.

But in winning the 800 metres title which the injured Rudisha was unable to defend, in a season's best of 1min 43.31sec, this young Ethiopian has fully established himself as a major rival in years to come.

Mohammed Aman sent out a strong message he is the future of 800 metres running after claiming the world title - the first Ethiopian to win a major title at a distance below 5,000m

Germany's Olympic discus champion Robert Harting got the chance to rip his shirt apart once more as he retained his world title with an effort of 69.11m.

Kirani James, Grenada's Olympic 400m champion, lost the world title he won two years ago to former US Olympic champion LaShawn Merritt, who returned from a doping ban to take silver in Daegu.

Merritt won in 43.74sec, the fastest time in the world this season, while James struggled home seventh in 44.99.

Hanna Melnychenko of the Ukraine held onto the lead she had taken into the final event to claim the heptathlon gold - but she needed to take almost three seconds off her personal best to do it as she strained every sinew to keep in touch with the Canada's Brianne Theisen Eaton, who had started the race in silver position and with a best that was more than three seconds superior to her own.

The effort tells as Ukraine's Hanna Melnychenko crosses the line after the final event of the heptathlon, the 800 metres, to secure a popular victory with the Moscow crowd

To the huge acclaim of the assembled blue and yellow clad Ukraine supporters in the main stand, Melnychenko crossed in 2:09.85 to earn the title with a personal best total of 6,586 points, finishing 56 points clear of Eaton, who also recorded a personal best of 6,530 as she took silver two days after her watching husband, Ashton, had retained his decathlon title.

Bronze, incredibly, went to Dafne Schippers, who had to receive brief medical attention after collapsing over the line with a time of 2:08.62 - almost seven seconds better than her personal best of 2:15.52.

It was, literally, a staggering effort from the Dutch athlete whose hopes of maintaining the 11 point lead gap between herself and the nearest challenger before this event had looked faint indeed.

Schippers was rewarded with a national record of 6,477.

It was an astonishing finale to the competition - the top eight in the last race all broke their personal bests. 

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