Sydney McLaughlin-Levrone rewrites record book again in 400 hurdles

“Just shock,” McLaughlin-Levrone said. “Honestly, shock.”

The last race at the U.S. Olympic track and field trials rapidly became less competition than the latest salvo of McLaughlin-Levrone’s sustained assault on preconceived barriers. She ran away from the eight other fastest 400-meter hurdlers in the nation before the homestretch. As the brick-red chasm grew, twin adversaries she has grown accustomed to surfaced: herself and the limits of human achievement.

McLaughlin-Levrone won again. On Sunday night, she broke the world record for the fifth time in a little over three years, resetting it to 50.65 seconds while finishing a staggering 1.99 seconds clear of runner-up Anna Cockrell. One year after a knee injury sidelined her for the world championships, McLaughlin-Levrone will head to the Paris Olympics in search of a second individual gold medal that feels like a formality. The reasons to watch will be aesthetic and historic.

The path to 50.65 began three years ago at the trials, where she wrested the world record for good from Dalilah Muhammad in 51.90 seconds. She lowered it to 51.46 at the Tokyo Olympics. In 2022, she dropped it to 51.41 at the national championships, then an unthinkable 50.68 at the world championships.

On a day when seven U.S. Olympic trials records fell, headlined by Tokyo silver medalist Rai Benjamin’s 46.46-second finish in the men’s 400-meter hurdles, McLaughlin-Levrone still stood apart. She operates in a realm just shy of fantastical. Her time would have beaten four sprinters in last week’s women’s 400-meter final — the one sans hurdles. She continued to do things that have never been done before.

“That excites me,” McLaughlin-Levrone said. “There’s something really exciting trying to figure out how to improve upon history in whatever capacity that looks like. That always is something I’m looking at.”

McLaughlin-Levrone astonishes even when she dabbles. At a May meet in Los Angeles, she beat Gabby Thomas, the 200 champion at these trials, in a 200. In June, McLaughlin-Levrone entered a 400 in New York and laid waste to the field in 48.75 — 0.05 seconds off the American record.

McLaughlin-Levrone decided against running a second individual event in Paris. “I like to hone in on one thing and do it the best of my ability,” she said. “I’m grateful we did that. I think today was a good testament of that.”

McLaughlin-Levrone’s versatility, combined with her decision to forgo an individual double attempt in Paris, permits imaginative speculation. In the mixed zone, a reporter asked whether she might run the 4x400 and the mixed relay in Paris. “I will help Team USA any way I can,” she said.

Another, more tantalizing possibility exists. After McLaughlin-Levrone answered questions from a gaggle of reporters, she walked out of a large white tent behind Hayward Field. She was asked one last question: Could she run not only on the 4x400 relay team but also the 4x100 team and try for three gold medals in Paris?

She widened her eyes, smiled and shrugged.

“Any way I can help,” she said.

The decision would have precedent. Allyson Felix, the legend who trained alongside McLaughlin-Levrone late in her career under Bobby Kersee, won gold in both relays at the 2012 London Olympics and the 2016 Rio de Janeiro Games. If McLaughlin-Levrone adds three gold medals to her current two at 24, it would position her to challenge — if not smash — Felix’s record of 11 track and field Olympic medals by career’s end.

McLaughlin-Levrone demonstrated the athletic superiority that allows for massive projection. As she walked into the blocks with her patented prerace scowl, she believed she had the form and fitness run a time in the high-50-second range. Kersee had told her, “Don’t be afraid to take it out.” He added that the 10 hurdles were Joe Frazier — and she was Muhammad Ali.

“She’s just an athlete, man,” Benjamin said. “She may not show it to you guys, but she’s a killer in real life.”

McLaughlin-Levrone burst inside Lane 5 and took the race by the throat. She separated from the hurdlers who started behind. She caught the ones ahead by the last curve. Down the stretch, she ran alone.

“She’s really fast, and she’s really strong,” Cockrell said. “It’s hard to put it any other way. She’s great at holding her speed. She executes hurdles 6 through 8 exceptionally well. She’s a great technician. So I know what I need to work on.”

When her time flashed on the clock, it read 50.67. “There’s no way,” McLaughlin-Levrone thought. A review adjusted it down another 0.02 seconds.

McLaughlin-Levrone called making the Olympics “reliving that childhood dream over and over again.”

Before the virtuosic 400 hurdles finals, the last night of the trials produced a procession of excellence. Nikki Hiltz (women’s 1,500 meters), Maggie Malone Hardin (women’s javelin), Masai Russell (women’s 100-meter hurdles), Grant Fisher (men’s 5,000 meters), Bryce Hoppel (men’s 800 meters), McLaughlin-Levrone and Benjamin set U.S. trials records.

“It is a super fast track,” Fisher said. “Even when there’s a little bit of wind, people can rip on this thing.”

Russell’s 12.25-second finish scared Keni Harrison’s eight-year-old, 12.20-second American record and separated the former Bullis School standout from a remarkably deep field. Alaysha Johnson and Grace Stark took the other two podium spots, leaving Harrison and Nia Ali, the past two Olympic silver medalists, home for Paris.

Fisher, the undisputed king of American distance running, won his second trials title. He held off Abdihamid Nur and a late charge from North Carolina’s Parker Wolfe to win the 5,000 in 13:08.85, a trials record he paired with his gold in the 10,000 on the first night of the trials. Pole vaulter Katie Moon, a gold medalist in Tokyo, returned to the Games with a second-place finish behind Virginia alum Bridget Williams.

More than 120 athletes made the Olympics over 10 days at Hayward Field. Some of them — Noah Lyles, Sha’Carri Richardson and so many others — will be among the brightest stars in Paris. None can match the palpable possibility of history that accompanies McLaughlin-Levrone to the starting line. She ran another time that defied even her own belief. It only left her wanting to do more.

“I would love to dip under 50 at some point,” she said. “I don’t know if that’s this year. I don’t know if that’s next year — whatever. Just chipping away, seeing what’s possible.”