The Swedish athlete beat Britain's 19-year-old heptathlete, Katarina Johnson-Thompson, who won the world junior long jump title this year, into second place, with fellow Swede Moa Hjelmer finishing in third place.

Bengtsson becomes the first Swedish athlete of either gender to be voted as a European Athletics Rising Star after a year in which she finished 20 centimetres clear of her nearest challenger as she defended her world junior title in Barcelona.

After winning at the 2009 World Youth Championships, Bengtsson has since dominated her event in the junior ranks and won every title on offer.

The following year, she won at the 2010 World Junior Championships in Moncton while still just 17 and then triumphed at the inaugural Youth Olympic Games in Singapore later that summer.

Angelica Bengtsson became the first pole vault winner at the inaugural Summer Youth Olympics in Singapore in 2010

In 2011, she focused her attention on a continental title and got the gold medal at the European Athletics Junior Championships in Tallinn, clearing what was then a world outdoor junior best of 4.57 metres.

This summer she defended her world junior title in style with a clearance at 4.50m before just failing at 4.60m, bringing the curtain down on her junior career in the Catalan city.

Bengtsson also holds the absolute world junior record of 4.63m, which was achieved under cover in February 2011 in front of her family and friends in Stockholm and this summer she added a centimetre to her world junior outdoor best when she scaled a Swedish senior record 4.58m at another Swedish venue in Sollentuna.

Bengtsson has also started to make her presence felt among the seniors this summer, competing in several Diamond League meetings and the London 2012 Olympic Games, as well as making the final at the 2012 European Athletics Championships in Helsinki.

Angelica Bengtsson competes in the women's pole vault qualification during the 31st European Athletics Indoor Championships at the Palais Omnisports de Paris-Bercy

"In the last two years (2010 and 2011) I had a hard time competing against the seniors, mainly because they are experienced and I'm not," she said recently

"Now, I think I've started to make my way in senior competitions."

Bengtsson won at the famous annual Finnkampen - Sweden v Finland - meeting in September in the stadium that hosted the 2006 European Athletics Championships to start to cement her place in the hearts of Swedish athletics supporters.

Bengtsson will be presented with her European Athletics Rising Star award at the European Athletics Awards Night in St Julians, Malta, on October 13 alongside the men's Rising Star winner Pavel Maslák, and the European Athlete of the Year winners, to be announced in the coming days.

Fans, media and European Athletics Member Federations were invited to vote for the European Athletics Rising Star on the European Athletics website.

Along with the votes from a panel of experts, each group of voters' results counted for one quarter of the athlete's final score.

Contact the writer of this story at [email protected]