By: Austin Fang

At the Worlds Athletics Competition in Eugene, Oregon, Sydney McLaughlin finished the 400-meter hurdles in a world record time of 50.68, smashing her previous record of 51.41 by 73 hundredths of a second.

This now makes it the 4th time in just 13 months that Sydney McLaughlin has broken the world record. Her previous record of stood only for a month before she broke it again last Friday.

In second place was the Netherland’s Femke Bol, and third place was fellow US runner Delilah Muhammad, but both were far from McLaughlin’s.

Despite all the astonishing times, McLaughlin still sees room for improvement. “I think we’re all figuring out that, yes, there are 10 barriers, but we can run them a lot faster than people think. I still think that wasn’t even a super clean race.” said the 22-year-old track star.

McLaughlin ended up walking home with a gold medal, a 100,000 dollar check – the prize for breaking a world record, and respect from the other competitors.

“It was crazy. She was so far in front at the end, that I was almost doubting if I really had a good race. Then, I saw the time and I thought, ‘Wow, that explains a lot.’” said Bol, who came second place with a time of 52.27.

Bol, 22, is the seventh fastest runner in history, but she is still far from McLaughlin. The New York Times reporter Scott Cacciola thinks that Bol could be “the contemporaneous rival who pushes McLaughlin through the 2024 Paris Olympics, and perhaps beyond.”

Before McLaughlin broke the world record 4 times in a row, Delilah Muhammad owned the record. In 2019, Muhammad broke the record twice. In one race, she beat McLaughlin by 0.07, walking away with a gold medal and a world record.

However, Muhammad, 32, has suffered injuries throughout the last couple of years “I was kind of nervous, honestly, going into this meet, not knowing where my fitness level would be,” she said. “So to get a medal shows my resilience as an athlete.”

Articles: https://www.nytimes.com/2022/07/22/sports/sydney-mclaughlin-400-hurdles.html https://www.espn.com/olympics/trackandfield/story/_/id/34282867/unreal-sydney-mclaughlin-obliterates-own-world-record-winning-first-400m-hurdles-title-world-championships