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Sydney McLaughlin-Levrone is a pioneer, one who sprints and leaps into new territory for the 400 metre hurdles. Breaking records and winning medals are commonplace for the 24-year-old American athlete who has her sights set on glory once again in Paris.
Reaching the peak of her sport in 2021, McLaughlin-Levrone defeated her constant rival and closest competitor Dalilah Muhammad in a world record time of 51.46 seconds to claim the Olympic gold in Tokyo.
Since then she’s been untouchable; consistently improving on her own record, most recently on June 30 2024, and adding the World Champion title to her list of achievements in 2022.
She is the most dominant athlete in her sport, drawing comparisons to Tiger Woods in his golfing prime, Serena Williams in tennis, and Michael Phelps, who headlined Olympic swimming for years.
McLaughlin-Levrone was marked for greatness from an early age. Born in New Jersey in 1999 to parents Willie and Mary McLaughlin both of whom were track and field athletes. Her father, a semi-finalist in the 400m 1984 Olympic Trials and her mother, a 2:12 half-miler at Cardinal O’Hara High School where she ran on the boys’ team.
It should be no surprise that McLaughlin-Levrone, along with her older brother and sister, followed in their parents’ footsteps and despite her siblings’ prowess for running, her father said it was clear that ‘Sydney was a little special’.
At the national junior championships in 2014, McLaughlin finished a close second in the 400 metre hurdles with a time of 55.63s - a national high school freshman record. She would have qualified to represent the United States at the IAAF World Junior Championships but was too young to be eligible. A year later she improved her 400m hurdles best to 55.28s at the national youth trials which was an age-15 world best and ranked second on the all-time world youth list.
By 16, the New Jersey native had claimed her first high school athlete of the year award, rewritten the high school record books and placed third in the 400m hurdles at the US Olympic Trials - setting a new world youth best and world junior record with a time of 54.15s to qualify for the Olympics in Rio de Janeiro. McLaughlin-Levrone was then eliminated before the final round and in an interview following the race, she vowed she would be back and ready to fight for a podium spot.
In the intervening years she improved her pace and developed a loose rivalry with fellow American Dalilah Muhammad who had claimed gold in the 400m hurdles in Rio. At the 2019 IAAF World Athletics Championships in Doha, McLaughlin ran a 52.23s but finished second behind Muhammad.
She reversed that result at the Tokyo Olympics, breaking the world record in the process and ascending to the pinnacle of her sport. Muhammad, the former world record holder, did not qualify for the Paris games, but has been praised for changing the landscape of the women’s 400m hurdles working with (and against) McLaughlin-Levrone to push the event to new heights.
Now McLaughlin-Levrone stands alone at the top.
In 2022, she broke her own world record during the USATF Championships then a month later at the World Championships set a new marker of 50.68s when becoming World Champion. In June this year at the United States Olympic Trials, McLaughlin-Levrone finished with a time of 50.65s, her latest world record run, the fifth time she’s done so.
In Paris, McLaughlin-Levrone is expected to rewrite history once more and has already expressed her desire to eventually dip under the 50-second barrier in the event. Dynamite Dutchwoman Femke Bol and the rest will hope to thrive in her slipstream but there appears little that can stop the 24-year-old becoming the first woman to retain the Olympic title in the event.
“She just broke the world record, and it’s like we’re not even shocked anymore,” said Muhammad after the US trials. “She’s just an amazing talent, a generational talent.”
