Noah Lyles, of the United States, lays on the track after the men's 200-metre final at the 2024 Summer Olympics on Aug. 8, 2024, in Saint-Denis, France.Matthias Schrader/The Associated Press
Noah Lyles lost the Olympic 200 metres Thursday, falling to Botswana’s Letsile Tebogo, then being tended to by medics who carted him off the track in a wheelchair. Later, wearing a mask, Lyles told reporters he had COVID but decided to compete anyway.
After crossing the line third for the second straight Olympics, Lyles fell to his back and writhed on the ground trying to catch his breath. He got to one knee and stayed there for nearly 30 seconds before getting up, asking for water and getting to the wheelchair.
“It definitely was an effect,” Lyles said. “But I mean, to be honest, I’m more proud of myself than anything for coming out and getting the bronze medal with COVID.”
An hour after that shock, Sydney McLaughlin-Levrone lowered her world record for the sixth time, finishing the 400-metre hurdles in 50.37 seconds for another Olympic blowout.
The hurdler expected to challenger her hardest, Femke Bol, finished third, behind American Anna Cockrell, who finished 1.5 seconds behind McLaughlin-Levrone.
This is McLaughlin-Levrone’s second straight gold and also the second straight Olympics the virus has played a major role in Lyles’s trip to the Games.
He also won the bronze in the Tokyo Olympics, and he has said the empty stands and the year-long delay before the Games led to depression that hampered his performance and inspired his road to Paris.
After winning a thrilling 100 metres four nights earlier, Lyles came to the news conference, pulled out the bronze medal from Tokyo, slapped it on the table and said that had been his motivation to add the shorter sprint to his repertoire in an attempt to become a larger-than-track star.
Now, he has two of those bronze medals, though the tale of this one played out much differently.
Lyles said he tested positive early Tuesday morning and quickly got into quarantine.
“I still wanted to run,” he said. “They said it was possible.”
The U.S. track federation released a statement saying it and the U.S. Olympic and Paralympic Committee adhered to all Olympic and Centers for Disease Control guidelines.
“After a thorough medical evaluation, Noah chose to compete tonight,” the statement said. “We respect his decision and will continue to monitor his condition closely.”
The men’s 4x100 relay is set for Friday, and Lyles was expected to run the anchor leg in what many thought would be a quest for a third gold medal in Paris. He said he would talk to his teammates and come to a decision.
“I want to be very honest and transparent, and I’m going to let them make the decision,” Lyles said, describing himself as being at around 90 or 95 per cent.
In the 200, Tebogo, 21, led wire-to-wire and won in 19.46 seconds, the fourth-fastest time in history, but .15 slower than Lyles’s top time. Kenny Bednarek finished in 19.62 for his second straight silver, and Lyles ran the curve in 19.70.
The first sign something might be wrong came a night earlier when Lyles finished second in a lacklustre semi-final, then left the track without talking to reporters to head to the medical tent. His coach said he was fine.
It became clear he was not when Tebogo and Bednarek reached the curve in the final.
Lyles was trailing as they headed into the homestretch, which is usually where he puts on a trademark closing finish that has always been the best part of a race that, before this week, he hadn’t lost since the third-place finish in Tokyo.
This time – nothing. Only a desperate push to the line then a collapse onto the purple track.
“To be honest, I knew if I wanted to come out here and win, I had to give everything I had from the get-go,” he said. “I didn’t have any time to save energy. So that was kind of the strategy for today.”
Tara Davis-Woodhall jumped 7.10 metres on her fourth jump to capture the gold medal and join the likes of Tianna Bartoletta, Brittney Reese and the great Jackie Joyner-Kersee as Americans to win that event.
Grant Holloway of the U.S. cruised to gold in the 110 hurdles, claiming the Olympic title that eluded him three years ago in his only major-championship loss. He won the world championship in 2019, 2022 and 2023. American teammate Daniel Roberts took silver.
Pakistan’s Arshad Nadeem put together the best meet of his life in winning the men’s javelin at Stade de France. Nadeem set an Olympic record in winning gold. His throw of 92.97 metres in his second attempt smashed the old mark of 90.57 set by Andreas Thorkildsen of Norway in 2008. India’s Neeraj Chopra, the 2020 Olympic champion, took silver at 89.45 metres, a season best.