Sha’Carri Richardson isn’t just back, she's better

Sha'Carri Richardson undeniably stands out as the most captivating, enthralling, and captivating sprinter since the era of the fastest man on earth, Usain Bolt. The global audience might not have fully realized this fact yet. It's not just due to the fact that the 23-year-old possesses remarkable speed akin to a sonic boom - as evidenced by her recent 10.65-second 100m sprint, surpassing Shelly-Ann Fraser-Pryce's previous record by 0.02 seconds.

Yet, it's not just her athletic prowess that sets her apart; it's the entirety of her being. Her appearance. Her personal journey. Her demeanor. And, indeed, even the challenges she carries. She clinched a gold medal at the World Athletics Championships, triumphing in the most significant 100-meter race.

She left her competitors, Shericka Jackson and the five-time world champion Shelly-Ann Fraser-Pryce, trailing far behind, marking the culmination of a two-year-long comeback journey. She wholeheartedly embodied the mantra she has echoed throughout the year - a mantra she reiterated once more following her recent triumph: "I'm not back. I'm better." With this achievement under her belt, she now stands just one race away from securing a double victory in Budapest.

It has been six years since an American woman won a 100m world title. As reported by news agency Associated Press (AP), Richardson joined fellow American Noah Lyles as 2023 100-meter world champions. Lyles clinched the top honours in the men's 100 meters in Sunday's final. It is the first time Americans have swept the 100-meter world titles since 2017 when Tori Bowie and Justin Gatlin both topped the podium in the event in London.

For Richardson, it has been some journey. From being abandoned by her mother to trying to take her own life during high school, she has charted his own path to glory, having never shied away from talking about her mental health struggles. It has made her many successes - including several college titles and junior world records - further more impressive.

Nearly two summers ago, soon after the Olympic trials in Oregon, Richardson's road to Tokyo was clogged by a positive test for marijuana. Her name turned into a litmus test in a wide-ranging debate about race, fairness, the often-impenetrable anti-doping rulebook and, ultimately, about the sometimes the thin line between ‘right' and ‘wrong', as AP reported.

But she soaked it all in, surrounded herself with supporters, and never 'gave up'. "I would say ‘never give up,'" she told the Associated Press. "Never allow media, never allow outsiders, never allow anything but yourself and your faith define who you are. I would say ‘Always fight. No matter what, fight.'" For this victory, in a field featuring four of the eight fastest sprinters in history, she fought. Just how she always has.

She did not surrender when the vagaries of the anti-doping rulebook placed her in the so-called ‘Semifinal of Death', paired against Jackson and Marie-Josée Ta Lou, who came in ranked fifth and eighth all-time respectively, in a race that guaranteed final berths only to the top two finishers.

There, she got off to a wretched start and had to rally from seventh to finish third in 10.84 seconds. She progressed to the final after her time was the fastest among all non-qualifiers. A mere 70 minutes later, she was lining up on the edge of the track in Lane 9 for the gold-medal race.

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It simply made no difference. Even though she registered the third-slowest start, nobody got too far ahead. In the end, it was a race between her and Jackson. The same Jackson she went up against on Tuesday. Jackson crossed and, unable to track what Richardson was doing so far on the outside, looked up to the scoreboard as though she might have won. But Richardson beat her by 0.07 seconds, Fraser-Pryce by 0.12 and Ta Lou by 0.16.

The new champion looked stunned after she crossed the finish line. Having blown a kiss toward the sky, she cast her eyes on the scoreboard and walked toward the stands in a daze to pay respects to the American flag as Fraser-Pryce, Dina Asher-Smith of Britain and others rushed to congratulate.

"All the heavy hitters were going to bring their ‘A' game, so it helped me pull out my best ‘A' game, as well," Richardson told AP. "I'm next to living legends. It feels remarkable."

Her makeover has drawn uncanny comparisons with the 100m world record holder Florence-Griffith Joyner, but who does she look up to? No, it is not Joyner. It is Bolt's journey, from the confines of track and field to a global superhero, that she mostly looks to emulate.

Richardson, whose first name is pronounced sha-KERRY, firmly believes that embracing her authentic self contributes to her enhanced speed. Her relatively modest stature, standing at 5 feet 1 inch, has compelled sports pundits to reevaluate their fixation on taller sprinters.

She was primed to become America's next sprint star when, with her orange hair flowing behind her, she cruised to a win at trials two years ago. But that victory quickly came off the books. For months, she had spiralled downward, both off the track and on. It was evident from her ninth-place finish in her much-hyped return from suspension at the Prefontaine Classic in 2021. Last year, she didn't make it to the World Championship team.

"A year ago, she was in no-man's land, as far as not making the team," her agent, former hurdler Renaldo Nehemiah, told AP. "And then, to come back and finally find her happy place, which is on the track, and to not try to compete with any kind of negative influences out there. I personally told her, ‘You'll never win that battle on your best day.'"

When asked after her biggest victory and what, exactly, she fixed between these years, she mentioned no word about technique, speed, or tactics.

"You bring who you are onto the track. You bring your athlete into your life," said Richardson. "Just knowing that people know me not just as an athlete, but as a person. There is no separate, honestly. "So I'm glad I can display who I really am. Not my pain. Not my sadness. I'm happy I can sit here and be happy with home, and just knowing that it all paid off."