American Richardson caps comeback by winning wild 100 at worlds
BUDAPEST, Hungary — American Sha’Carri Richardson won the women’s 100-meter world title Monday, outsprinting a star-studded field to take a gold medal two years after a positive marijuana test derailed her Olympic dreams.
Running on the far outside in Lane 9, Richardson finished in 10.65 seconds to match the year’s best time and set the world-championship record.
She beat Jamaicans Shericka Jackson by .07 seconds and five-time champion Shelly-Ann Fraser-Pryce by .12.
“I’m here, I told y’all,” she told the track announcer right after the race. “I’m not back, I’m better.”
This was Richardson’s first major competition on the world stage and she was listed as a 5-1 underdog even though she came in as the American champion and had bested Jackson, who also has run 10.65 this year, the previous two times they met in 2023.
The race featured four of the eight fastest runners of all time, including Marie-Josée Ta Lou, who finished fourth.
Though it was clear Richardson had finished ahead of all those runners to her left in the gold-medal race, the 23-year-old looked stunned when she crossed the line.
She blew a kiss toward the sky, cast her eyes on that beautiful scoreboard and walked toward the stands in a daze to accept the American flag and congratulations from Fraser-Pryce, Dina Asher-Smith of Britain and others.
What a comeback story it was — and just in time for the buildup to the Paris Olympics, which start less than 12 months from now.
Richardson appeared ready to become America’s next sprint star when she cruised to a win at Olympic trials two years ago. But that victory quickly came off the books after she tested positive for marijuana — a doping violation she readily admitted, saying she was in a bad place after the recent death of her mom.
A raucous debate ensued over whether marijuana, not a performance enhancer, really belonged on the banned list (it’s still there), and also whether regulators were too keen to go after a young, outspoken, Black, American woman (they said everyone is subject to the same rules).
After a few unsuccessful comeback attempts — she finished an embarrassing last at a much-hyped return a few weeks after the Tokyo Olympics — Richardson finally started rounding into form to start 2023. About a year ago, she bared her soul in a live chat on social media, urging people to find their true selves, much the way she had done.
She also found herself on the track, and when the biggest race this side of the Olympics was over Monday night, everyone was looking at her.
She did it with a lot going against her.
The vagaries of track and field’s rulebook had placed her in the socalled Semifinal of Death, paired against Jackson and Ta Lou in a race, with only the top two guaranteed spots in the final.
In that semifinal, Richardson got off to a wretched start and had to rally from seventh to finish third in 10.84. Her time was the fastest among all nonqualifiers, so she made it. But a mere 70 minutes later, she was out in Lane 9 for the final, as tough a spot as there is because there’s no way to feel how the top contenders — or anyone, really — is doing.
When Jackson, running in Lane 4, crossed the line, she looked up as though maybe she had won.
But no. It was Richardson crossing first and becoming the first American to win the 100 world title since the late Tori Bowie in 2017. She also stopped Fraser-Pryce, who had won in 2019 and 2022, from matching pole vaulter Sergey Bubka’s record of six world titles in an individual discipline.
Grant Holloway breezes in 110-meter hurdles for his 3rd straight world title
Posing for the cameras, Grant Holloway counted out his back-to-backto-back 110-meter hurdles world titles, raising one finger, then another, then another.
It was as easy as “1, 2, 3.” Holloway made his race look almost that simple, too.
The American bolted to a fast start and never looked back Monday night at world championships, breezing to a victory in 12.96 seconds that elevated him into elite company. Holloway joined Greg Foster as the only 110 hurdler to win three straight world titles.
“Remarkable,” Holloway exclaimed.
Before Holloway entered the scene, the mighty American hurdlers were in a little bit of a hurdling funk (a funk for them anyway). They’d gone two straight worlds without a gold in the 110.
That just wasn’t like them. “We were in a drought,” said Holloway, who won his first world title in Doha in 2019 and again last summer in Oregon. “It was my goal is to get us out of the drought and I called it a restoration phase. Now that we’re out of the restoration phase, it’s making sure I’m there.”
He insisted his celebration shortly after the race while standing in the middle of the track was spontaneous. This wasn’t a pre-planned sort of thing, because nothing can be planned with 10 hurdles standing in the way.
With the camera still zoomed in, Holloway held up all three fingers one final time before bouncing off to celebrate. He edged out reigning Olympic champion Hansle Parchment of Jamaica by .11 seconds. Holloway’s U.S. teammate, Daniel Roberts, finished with the bronze.
“When Hansle and Daniel and the rest of that field is in that race, you can never count anybody out,” said the 25-year-old Holloway, who went to high school in Virginia before starring at the University of Florida. “The main thing is really just to continue to build off this consistency, build off this success and continue to take the sport to high hopes.”
Noah Lyles breaks into tears on medal stand after receiving gold medal for 100-meter win
All the brashness and bravado melted away when the gold medal finally went around Noah Lyles’ neck Monday night at the world championships.
The 100-meter winner doubled over and broke into tears at the ceremony, held the day after he defied the experts and earned the title “World’s Fastest Man” with a victory in what has traditionally been his second-best race.
After Lyles composed himself, he stood up and took a deep bow to the crowd amassed at the medals plaza set up outside the stadium.
The entire moment has hit him quicker than he ever anticipated. Much quicker than winning his backto-back world 200 titles.
“I’m trying to get the right words — this is the fastest medal that’s sunk in the quickest,” Lyles told The Associated Press in an interview earlier Monday about his win. “This one, it’s definitely like, ‘Title of fastest man of the world. Title of the 100-meter champion. Running the world-leading time. Grabbing the medal.’ That is the one I’ve been reaching for, for so long — and I got it.”
The belief that he was indeed the fastest, now that’s always been present. This victory simply validated it to everyone else.
“It’s just now everybody believes it, because I have a championship to go with it,” Lyles said. “But I’ve always known that I’m the fastest man in the world, which is why it’s so hard for everybody.”
Lyles finished the race Sunday night in 9.83 seconds to edge Letsile Tebogo, the 20-year-old from Botswana, and bronze medalist Zharnel Hughes of Britain.
Tebogo and Hughes were with Lyles on the medal stand and comforted him when he broke down. Lyles has been open and honest about the mental health struggles he’s endured, especially in the post-COVID atmosphere of the Tokyo Olympics.
“(My mental health has) definitely been growing stronger and stronger since 2021,” Lyles said. “Every year I feel that I’ve been able to continuously add on to layers of security, I guess you could call it, or just good health.
“It’s really put a perspective on how I’ve been able to view things.”