TOKYO —For two years American hurdlers Sydney McLaughlin and Dalilah Muhammad skimmed past questions about the Olympic Games and just how far they could lower the world record like they were just another set of hurdles.
It was only once Muhammad, the reigning Olympic and World champion, was safely in the 400 meter hurdles final that she hinted at what to expect.
The pair, Muhammad said, would “put on a show.”
That they did.
In arguably the greatest women’s race in track and field history, McLaughlin edged past Muhammad in the final 10 meters to claim the gold medal in 51.46 seconds, shattering her own world record.
“I can’t really (get) it straight in my head yet,” McLaughlin said. “I’m sure I’ll process it and celebrate later.”
In a race that was a near mirror the men’s 400 hurdles final less than 24 hours earlier where Norway’s Karsten Warholm and Rai Benjamin of the U.S. were both under the world record, Muhammad was also below the old record, claiming the silver in 51.58. The Netherlands’ Femke Bol took the bronze in a European record 52.03, just off the previous world record of 51.90 set by McLaughlin in winning the Olympic Trials in June.
USC’s Anna Cockrell, the NCAA champion, was disqualified.
“This means that this year we have fantastic results in the 400m hurdles, for women as well as men,” said Viktoriya Tkachuk of Ukraine, the sixth place finisher. “I don’t understand how this is all happening, honestly.”
A historic moment
The sport had obsessed about a McLaughlin-Muhammad showdown in Tokyo almost as soon as the pair crossed the finish line at the 2019 World Championships in Doha, when Muhammad ran a world record 52.16 to hold off McLaughlin by just seven-hundreths of a second.
In reality, Wednesday’s epic had been building since the 2016 Olympic Trials when both runners made Team USA, McLaughlin then a 17-year-old New Jersey high school junior.
Muhammad claimed gold later that summer in Rio de Janeiro while McLaughlin was eliminated in the semifinals.
McLaughlin would go on to win the NCAA title at Kentucky as a freshman and then turn pro, signing with New Balance, and relocating to Los Angeles, eventually training with Bobby Kersee, who has guided the gold medal careers of Allyson Felix, Joanna Hayes, Gail Devers and Jackie Joyner-Kersee.
The rivalry heated up in 2019. McLaughlin posted a series of victories on the Diamond League circuit, flirting with the then 16-year-old world record of 52.34 set by Russia’s Yulia Pechonkina. But it was Muhammad who broke the record with a 52.20 win at the 2019 U.S. Championships in Des Moines. Muhammad lowered the mark again at Worlds but it was clear McLaughlin was closing the gap.
While McLaughlin continued to impress early this season, Muhammad battled to come back from a hamstring injury and after contracting COVID-19 twice.
“I think that at my Trials, a month before Trials, my fitness started coming back around and I felt in good shape at the Trials,” Muhammad said. “I am feeling good now, COVID is thankfully behind me and the injuries (hamstring) that followed. So, I am feeling good and ready to run.”
Muhammad was no match for McLaughlin at the Trials, finishing more than a half-second behind her at 52.42, still the eighth fastest time in history.
But Muhammad looked Rio fit in the Olympic rounds. Adding to the intrigue was Bol, who posted a series of impressive wins on the Diamond League circuit this summer in the U.S. duo’s absence.
Warholm’s world record shattering victory Monday afternoon further raised the expectations for the women’s final.
“I think you will see something similar in the women’s 400m hurdles with Sydney, Dalilah, Femke,” said Kyron McMaster of the British Virgin Islands, fourth in the men’s final. “Those three are amazing. They are looking powerfully great. They are about to go do something great like Warholm did.”
Muhammad, running in lane 7, went out hard, building a sizable lead midway down the backstretch.
McLaughlin, in lane 4, remained patient and began to cut into it around the final turn.
“The race doesn’t really start till hurdle seven,” she said.
But Muhammad continued to hold on into the homestretch, over the eight hurdle, then then ninth. She still led at the 10th and final hurdle before the momentum of McLaughlin’s surge carried her past the defending gold medalist.
“I saw Dalilah ahead of me with one to go,” McLaughlin said “I just thought, ‘Run your race.’”
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