G.O.A.Ts (Greatest of All Time) Speeches from the Toastmasters World Championship of Public Speaking

Every year, the Toastmasters organization culminates its twelve months with an international conference where among other rituals and formalities, it picks its new President, Board of Directors, Committees and also crowns its World Champion of Public Speaking.

The World Championship of Public Speaking contest began in 1938 and has grown to over 50,000 participants in 149 countries in 2022. In its early decades, it was simply referred to as the Toastmasters Speech Contest. By the 1990s, there were more than 10,000 participants every year. The contest’s popularity grew rapidly in the 2000s and the contest has been often called the “largest speech contest in the world”.

Every public speaker who has come across these world championship speeches will have their own favorites. With so many of them and it is hard to pick from them and hard to find some of the older classics from Craig Valentine and others. My favorites in no particular order:

Dananjaya Hettiararchchi’s 2014 Toastmasters World Championship of Public Speaking speech: I See Something In You!

Mohammed Qatani‘s 2015 Toastmasters World Championship of Public Speaking speech: The Power of Words

Verity Price’s 2021 Toastmasters World Championship of Public Speaking speech: A Great Read

Presiyan Vasilev’s 2013 Toastmasters World Championship of Public Speaking speech: Changed By A Tire

Mike Carr’s 2020 Toastmasters World Championship of Public Speaking speech: The Librarian and Mrs. Montogomery

Ramona J. Smith’s 2018 Toastmasters World Championship of Public Speaking speech: Still Standing

Cyril Junio Dim’s 2022 Toastmasters World Championship of Public Speaking: Ndini

Darren LaCroix’s Toastmasters World Championship of Public Speaking speech: Ouch

Mark Brown’s Toastmasters World Championship of Public Speaking speech:craig

I have enjoyed learning from these Toastmasters World Championship of Public Speaking G.O.A.Ts like I did and you take away practical tips and best practices to take your public speaking to the next level. Go forth and communicate!