In a world-leading 10.71 seconds, Sha’Carri Richardson won her second consecutive national title and dominated the women’s 100-meter race to cap off the second night of competition at Hayward race for the 2024 US Olympic Trials. Coach Dennis Mitchell’s Star Athletics team swept the two Olympic berths, with 2022 US champion Melissa Jefferson (10.80) and TeeTee Terry (10.89), who train with Richardson in Florida, taking second and third place, respectively.
Richardson is the overwhelming favorite to win gold in one of the most important events of the Games—the 100-meter final in Paris on August 3—six weeks away. She is attempting to regain the title that has not been won by an American woman since Gail Devers in Atlanta in 1996. On the same track where she set herself on fire tonight, Richardson won the US Olympic Trials three years prior. However, two weeks later, she was banned from the competition and her title was revoked when a post-race drug test proved she had used marijuana. A week prior to the Trials, Richardson claimed to have learnt of her biological mother’s passing via a reporter. She claimed to have taken marijuana prior to the race as a stress reliever.
While Richardson shown glimmers of her previous form in 2022, she was unable to go past the first round of the US Championship and was not selected to compete in the World Championship, which was hosted in the US that year. She finished dead last in the Diamond League final in Zurich in 11.13 to cap off the season.
2023 World Champion
It’s hard to see 2023 being any different. Richardson dominated the circuit, winning five of her seven 100-meter events and taking home her first official US title. She ran the entire season with the tagline “I’m not back, I’m better.” She defeated the reigning champion Shelly-Ann Fraser-Pryce and Jamaican sensation Shericka Jackson in Budapest to win the global title, capping the year with a championship record of 10.65.