Noah Lyles jokes that the patch of carpet from his bathroom to the spare bedroom of his home is still wet from the stint Matt Hudson-Smith spent living with him.
The world’s fastest man was perpetually perplexed by the British 400metre runner’s penchant for never drying his feet after a shower, how fine he cut it time wise to make practice and his generally carefree attitude.
But Lyles is also adamant Hudson-Smith is so good he’ll end up being knighted by the king one day.
The pair seem like perhaps unlikely former housemates but, come Wednesday, Hudson-Smith is aiming to emulate Lyles as an Olympic champion.
While Lyles is focused on repeating the sprint treble he achieved at last year’s World Athletics Championships in Budapest, Hudson-Smith is adamant his occasional training partner is no sort of inspiration.
“His success doesn’t actually inspire me in the slightest as I inspire myself,” he said. “He has his own mission as do I. What he is doing is good but I want to emulate my own success.”
For his part, Lyles is adamant his former lodger is a shoo-in for the gold and yet he seems both bemused and amused by him.
“It’s funny,” said the American. “I don’t know if he’s told anybody yet but I remember when he was like, ‘as soon as I’ve won a medal, I’m retiring’.
“He won a medal two years ago and he’s still going so I’m hoping that he gets knighted and I get to see him get knighted. Sir Matthew Hudson-Smith.”
Hudson-Smith has looked imperious this season, even more so here in Paris where he ripped the field apart in the opening 70m and was never troubled, easing up halfway down the straight to win his semi-final.
He didn’t stop to talk to the media post-race, instead simply wagging a finger and laughing.
Many are ready to place the gold around his neck already at the 2024 Olympics and the athlete himself is well aware of his pre-race favourite tag. To his rivals, he said simply, “If you want to win it, you’ve got to take it [the gold] from me. I’m ready.”
A gold to follow that of Keely Hodgkinson in the 800m would be historic making him the first British male to do so since Eric Liddell, of Chariots of Fire fame, to do so exactly 100 years ago in the same city.
Of that potential for history making, Hudson-Smith said simply: “It’s one step at a time. I’m very much a person who is present right now. I’ve got to take care of the now and then I look to the future and take care of everything.”
Gold would cap a remarkable journey, his career littered with injuries and following the admission when he won his first World Championship medal in 2022 that he had previously attempted to commit suicide.
Key figures have helped to rebuild him from his coach Gary Evans to another former Olympic champion for the distance, Christine Ohuruogu, who is constantly in his ear to advise and reassure.
The combination of voices is clearly working as he has slashed half a second off his personal best already this season and, going into the final, intimates he can run quicker yet.
“You know after 2021 when that reality check did hit,” he said looking back on the darker days, “I had a lot of talks and people basically saying to me ‘it’s time to take the sport seriously’.
“I watched a podcast with Michael Johnson and he was saying that you do things not because you like it but because you have to do it. There are no real excuses. I used to avoid the gym like the plague.
“It’s been a long road but I think maturity, growth and being a total overall athlete has allowed me to be the best version of myself. Now, the results are showing.”
