The most unbeatable track athlete in the world -- and one of the best athletes in the world, period -- represents the United States and her name is Sydney McLaughlin-Levrone.
McLaughlin-Levrone isn't just the best 400-meter hurdler in women's history. When you see her go, you understand how her specialty is unique. Most other runners just don't make it look this easy, because they can't make it look this easy. Her form is perfect. Every time. You know how we see these world records get broken with every Olympics and the times are wildly improved from athletes two generations prior? That's what it's like watching McLaughlin-Levrone, only she's doing it against contemporaries.
It's like she beamed back from the future. That's how much better she is than the field.
Given the way she has separated from her competition and redefined the boundaries of what's physically possible in women's hurdling, she can fairly be called the greatest hurdler -- regardless of gender -- of all time.
And on Thursday, the sports world bore witness once again to her transcendent dominance.
McLaughlin-Levrone set her sixth world record in the 400 hurdles, easily winning gold by running and hurdling the big purple oval at Stade de France in 50.37 seconds. (Her time was so good it would've nearly landed McLaughlin-Levrone in the 400-meter finals -- the race without the hurdles.)
There’s NO catching Sydney McLaughlin-Levrone!
— NBC Olympics & Paralympics (@NBCOlympics) August 8, 2024
She adds ANOTHER 400m hurdles gold medal and WORLD RECORD to her collection. #ParisOlympics pic.twitter.com/RJ7reApKfV
The win gives McLaughlin-Levrone an astonishing reality: She is the only woman to ever win back-to-back gold medals in the 400-meter hurdles. What a phenomenal Olympian. McLaughlin-Levrone can claim supremacy over her sport like Simone Biles and Katie Ledecky do in theirs. It is a joy to watch her so effortlessly gallup past so-called competitors. It makes the pre-race chatter even more hilarious after the fact. Prior to Thursday's run there was faint curiosity if this event would wind up being the scene of yet another upset in track at these Olympics. After all, they'd been popping up with regularity; we even saw it materialize in the men's 200-meter final. (More on that in just a moment.)
Would Femke Bol of the Netherlands run the race of her life and out-do McLaughlin-Levrone? Turns out she couldn't even out-do Anna Cockrell. Cockrell, an American, took silver (51.87) behind McLaughlin-Levrone, while Bol had to settle for bronze (52.15).
These Games provided the stage for a true star turn for the 25-year-old McLaughlin-Levrone. She burst onto the global scene in Tokyo and, yes, in the track and field world she's been the envy of most for years. But in showing out so definitively in front of fans on the Paris stage -- at the most compelling Olympics in at least 12 years -- McLaughlin-Levrone upped her profile to the highest tier for an American Olympian. Especially when you factor in how she hasn't lost in the 400-meter hurdles in five years.
She's expected to run again in 2028 at the Los Angeles Games, and it's there and then when she could opt to go supernova status. Her talent is so obvious, the temptation to expand her program and run the 400 (sans hurdles), or the 200-meter dash, or basically any race she wants, will be there.
The hype will be earned and widespread. McLaughlin-Levrone has already cemented her reputation among the all-time great American Olympians. In 2028, she goes for pantheon status. We'll all be waiting, eagerly, to see her chase it.
And speaking of pantheon status ...
Noah Lyles' bid for the double halted by COVID
Noah Lyles had something rarely attainable available to him at these Games. The 2024 Olympics were set up to catapult the gifted track speedster to American superstardom. To be the face of American track. In order to truly break through to all-time status, this elite sprinter would need to clear two massive hurdles in order to get there.
Lyles had to pull off the grueling, ever-coveted double: win gold in both the 100- and 200-meter dashes.
Carl Lewis is the only American to ever do that. Lyles got halfway there on Sunday night when he roared from behind to barely beat Jamaica's Kishane Thompson in one of the most dramatic 100-meter finals in history. Lyles' chest beat Thompson's torso by five one-thousandths of a second: 9.784 to 9.789 seconds.
Then, a conspicuous thing in the past two days. Lyles was seen wearing a medical face mask prior to stepping into the open air of Stade de France. Was it precautionary?
It was COVID. Lyles confirmed as much on Thursday after he failed in his quest to take the double. This also explains why Lyles didn't even finish first in his semifinal heat on Wednesday.
"I woke up early, about 5 a.m. on Tuesday morning, and I just was feeling really horrible, and I knew that it was more than being sore from the 100," Lyles said on NBC. "My first thought was not to panic. I was thinking I've been in worse situations, I've run with worse conditions, I felt, and we just took it day by day, trying to hydrate as much, quarantined off."
Lyles, whose competitive spirit is as evident as any athlete at these Olympics, said he never debated not running in the 200. (If you weren't aware, it's been official Olympics policy to allow athletes to compete while having COVID, in essence treating it like other common respiratory illnesses.)
Running sick, Lyles still managed to earn a bronze, but he was clearly not himself. He was beaten by his Team USA comrade, Kenny Bednarek, who took silver, and was downright dusted by Botswana's Letsile Tebogo, who won the gold after running the fifth-fastest 200 in history.
Tebogo sprinted to first in 19.46 seconds. Bednarek reached the line in 19.62, while Lyles was well off his personal-best time of 19.31 that he set two years ago.
Down (but impressively far from out) with disease, Lyles would've needed to run something borderline alien in order to win gold. Tebogo won the first gold for Africa ever in the 200. It was also the first gold for Botswana in ANY Olympic event.
"It's taken its toll for sure," Lyles said on NBC after the race. "But I've never been more proud of myself for being able to come out here, and getting a bronze medal, where last Olympics I was very disappointed. This time, I couldn't be more proud."
The top American sprinter now owns two bronzes in the 200. The painfully irony of it all is that Lyles has proven to be the most consistent runner in the 200 for the better part of a half-decade. Yet he'll probably never take an Olympic gold in his best event.
In falling short in the 200, Lyles in essence lost out on his chance to be the biggest track athlete at an Olympics since Usain Bolt. Additionally, Lyles' outspoken nature has led to him be something of a polarizing athlete. He infamously took aim at NBA players last year for proclaiming "world champion" status despite competing only on North American soil. That brought blowback. Thursday's third-place run was a moment for his critics to crow if they so chose.
Except, peer into the race through his eyes. Was he going to work for four years and not run in the 200? It was policy to allow him to compete with COVID. Obviously he was going to give it a go. Had he not even medaled, it would've been understandable. When Lyles -- who has long battled asthma, remember -- says he's proud of winning bronze, I believe him. American sports fans can come to expect U.S. athletes to win gold when they pop out of bed, as if the road to doing it wasn't as grueling as any other sport. When gold doesn't happen, it can feel like failure. It shouldn't. The Olympics hand out three prizes for a reason.
Sometimes, just making it to the podium can feel like a victory. Lyles got the gold in the 100. He is now the Fastest Man in the World. Ironically, his best event is where his body failed him, through little fault of his own.
That's the tricky thing about these races. No matter how we think they're gonna go, the ending is never guaranteed.
Unless, of course, your name is Sydney McLaughlin-Levrone.
