The winning athletes are decided by counting votes from fans, media and European Athletics member federations, as well as an expert European Athletics panel.

Results from each group of voters counts for one quarter of the athlete's final score.

Britain's Mo Farah is one of the three shortlisted for the men's athlete of the year award.

Farah defended both his 5,000 metres and 10,000m Olympic titles at Rio 2016 and was also Europe’s fastest man over 1500m, 3,000m, 5,000m, 10,000m and the half-marathon this year.

The second male nominee is Italian Gianmarco Tamberi, who won the high jump title at both the World Indoor Championships in Portland and the European Athletics Championships in Amsterdam.

The third and final nominee in the men's category is Thomas Röhler of Germany, after he threw 90.30m in Rio to claim the Olympic javelin title.

In the women's athlete of the year category, the first nominee is Spain's Ruth Beitia.

The popular 37-year-old took high jump silver at the World Indoor Championships, before defending her European title.

Beitia then finally won an Olympic gold medal in Rio, clearing 1.97m to become the oldest winner of an Olympic high jump title. 

Ekaterini Stefanidi of Greece has also made it to the final three after she won the pole vault gold medal in Rio, to become the first Greek woman to win an Olympic field event.

Polish hammer thrower Anita Wlodarczyk rounds off the list after she enjoyed an unbeaten season, winning the European title and then throwing a world record of 82.29m to win the gold medal in Rio, which she then improved to 82.98m later in August.

The awards also recognise up and coming talent in the shape of the Rising Star prizes.

Germany's Max Hess is the first male on the shortlist after he took the triple jump silver medal at the World Indoor Championships, before he added the European title with a personal best and European-leading mark of 17.20m at the age of 19. 

Matthew Hudson-Smith of Britain, at the age of 21, made the final of the Rio 2016 Olympic Games 400m after running 44.48sec in his semi-final, the fastest European under-23 time for 24 years and the fastest European senior time since 2012. 

Norwegian Karsten Warholm completes the male shortlist after the former world youth octathlon champion ran a 400m hurdles national record of 48.49sec at Rio 2016, the fastest time in the world by an under-23 athlete. 

Meanwhile, Rio 2016 heptathlon champion Nafissatou Thiam of Belgium has been nominated for the women's rising star award.

Thiam won the gold with a national record of 6810 points, just six days before her 22nd birthday, and she set personal bests in five of her seven events to add more than 300 points to her previous best overall score. 

Britain's Dina Asher-Smith is another nominee as the 20-year-old won the European 200m title before going on to finish fifth at the Olympic Games in 22.31sec.

Sara Kolak of Croatia rounds off the list of nominees.

The javelin thrower won the bronze medal at the European Athletics Championships, before she threw a national record of 66.18m to claim the Olympic gold medal in Brazil.

European Athletics will announce the winner of each category on the evening of the awards ceremony on October 15, in Funchal.

On the same evening, European Athletics will also recognise the winners of the coaching and innovation awards.