Stade de Colombes, Paris, October 4, 1925
Sweden's Sten "Sten-Pelle" Pettersson dashed the official 400 metres hurdles WR of 53.8 in October in Paris. The USA's Ivan Riley, who showed strong form in 1923, came second but was 1.2 seconds behind Pettersson. However, Riley won the high hurdles easily.
The unofficial WR for the 400m hurdles was still held by Olympic champion F. Morgan Taylor, who had clocked 52.6 in the 1924 Paris Games. However, it was not accepted as official because hurdles had been knocked over during the race.
In addition to Pettersson, at the high-level invitational meet in Paris, Finland's Eero Berg, the Olympic bronze medalist in the steeplechase and holder of the world leading time, distinguished himself by running to victory in the 5000. In the 3000, season's newcomer Nils Eklöf won, and Berg came second.
Fast athletes from the Netherlands gradually began to appear on the European scene. Marinus van den Berge dashed to victory in Paris with a time of 10.6 seconds, which equaled the sixth place in the world rankings.
The USA's Harry Evans clocked the season's leading time of 21.4 in the 200. Van den Berghe stormed to second place with 21.6. The Flying Dutchman's result was apparently not a fluke, as he achieved the same time already in the heats.
Evans placed fifth in the 1925 US Championships and was not heard from again in the coming years.
Charles Hoff, who had improved the world record a couple of times in late summer, won the pole vault with his season's third-best vault of 4.15 (13-7½). Hoff took the top six spots in the world rankings, even though he only started competing in mid-August.
Future long jump world record holder Silvio Cator landed 7.61m (24-11½) from the take-off board. The result was the sixth-best in the world for the season. Cator was from Haiti but lived and trained in France.
Idrottsbladet, October 5, 1925 (in Swedish)
Helsingin Sanomat, October 7, 1925 (in Finnish)
Uusi Suomi, October 9, 1925 (in Finnish)