Sydney McLaughlin-Levrone enters 400m among Los Angeles Grand Prix headliners

By OlympicTalkApr 28, 2023, 10:56 AM EDT

Kirby Lee-USA TODAY Sports

Sydney McLaughlin-Levrone, the Olympic and world champion and world record holder in the 400m hurdles, is an early entry into the 400m without hurdles for the Los Angeles Grand Prix on May 27, according to USA Track and Field.

Organizers announced headline athletes Thursday, including a 100m hurdles field with the two fastest women in history (Nigerian Tobi Amusan and American Keni Harrison) and Olympic champion Jasmine Camacho-Quinn of Puerto Rico. The men’s shot put includes the Americans who swept the 2022 World Championships medals: world record holder Ryan Crouser, Joe Kovacs and Josh Awotunde.

NBC Sports and Peacock air meet coverage on May 27 from 4:30-6 p.m. ET.

While McLaughlin-Levrone’s entry into the flat 400m is notable given her comments last year about wanting to add the event to her program, note four things:

*Her coach, Bob Kersee, is one of the Los Angeles Grand Prix organizers, so it’s no surprise she is on the entry list.
*The women’s 400m hurdles is not on the meet program.
*Athlete fields are subject to change, especially a month out from the meet.
*McLaughlin-Levrone often races events other than the 400m hurdles at non-championship meets and has not publicly said whether she plans to race the flat 400m at July’s USA Track and Field Outdoor Championships, the qualifying meet for August’s world championships.

It would be her first time racing an individual flat 400m since April 2021 and the third time in her professional career dating to 2019.

McLaughlin-Levrone said after last season that she wanted to add the flat 400m to her program while not giving up the 400m hurdles just yet.

Her personal best in the 400m is 50.07 seconds, set in 2018 as a University of Kentucky freshman. That time would have placed fourth at last July’s world championships.

A better measure of her potential is her 4x400m relay split from those worlds: 47.91 seconds — making her the seventh-fastest relay performer in history and second-fastest in the last 34 years behind Allyson Felix. Relay splits, outside of leadoff legs, are also usually significantly faster than an athlete’s best individual 400m time due to running starts.

McLaughlin-Levrone has a decision to make for this summer. She has a bye into the 400m hurdles at August’s worlds in Budapest as reigning world champion. That gives her leeway to race the flat 400m instead at July’s USATF Outdoor Championships, where the top three are in line to qualify for the individual event at worlds.

Nobody has ever won both events at a single world championships. Few, if any, have raced both at a worlds.

Come August’s worlds, the women’s 400m hurdles first round heats start 2 hours and 20 minutes before the women’s 400m semifinals. Top-level pros rarely race multiple times in one session in a distance longer than 200 meters at any meet.

The Olympic schedule is as accommodating as ever for a possible women’s 400m-400m hurdles double in 2024.

For the first time in Olympic history, none of the rounds of those races take place on the same day at the Games. But doing both through the finals would still be a challenge: racing six consecutive days at the Olympics (and a seventh day at the end if adding the 4x400m relay).

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At the French Open, a Ukrainian mom makes her comeback

By OlympicTalkMay 31, 2023, 12:02 PM EDT

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Ukraine’s Elina Svitolina, once the world’s third-ranked tennis player, is into the French Open third round in her first major tournament since childbirth.

Svitolina, 28, swept 2022 French Open semifinalist Martina Trevisan of Italy, then beat Australian qualifier Storm Hunter 2-6, 6-3, 6-1 to reach the last 32 at Roland Garros. She next plays 56th-ranked Russian Anna Blinkova, who took out the top French player, fifth seed Caroline Garcia, 4-6, 6-3, 7-5 on her ninth match point.

Svitolina’s husband, French player Gael Monfils, finished his first-round five-set win after midnight on Tuesday night/Wednesday morning. She watched that match on a computer before going to sleep ahead of her 11 a.m. start Wednesday.

“This morning, he told me, ‘I’m coming to your match, so make it worth it,'” she joked on Tennis Channel. “I was like, OK, no pressure.

“I don’t know what he’s doing here now. He should be resting.”

FRENCH OPEN DRAWS: Women | Men | Broadcast Schedule

Svitolina made at least one major quarterfinal every year from 2017 through 2021, including the semifinals at Wimbledon and the U.S. Open in 2019. She married Monfils one week before the Tokyo Olympics, then won a singles bronze medal.

Svitolina played her last match before maternity leave on March 24, 2022, one month after Russia invaded her country. She gave birth to daughter Skai on Oct. 15.

Svitolina returned to competition in April. Last week, she won the tournament preceding the French Open, sweeping Blinkova to improve to 17-3 in her career in finals. She’s playing on a protected ranking of 27th after her year absence and, now, on a seven-match win streak.

“It was always in my head the plan to come back, but I didn’t put any pressure on myself, because obviously with the war going on, with the pregnancy, you never know how complicated it will go,” she said. “I’m as strong as I was before, maybe even stronger, because I feel that I can handle the work that I do off the court, and match by match I’m getting better. Also mentally, because mental can influence your physicality, as well.”

Svitolina said she’s motivated by goals to attain before she retires from the sport and to help Ukraine, such as donating her prize money from last week’s title in Strasbourg.

“These moments bring joy to people of Ukraine, to the kids as well, the kids who loved to play tennis before the war, and now maybe they don’t have the opportunity,” she said. “But these moments that can motivate them to look on the bright side and see these good moments and enjoy themselves as much as they can in this horrible situation.”

Svitolina was born in Odesa and has lived in Kharkiv, two cities that have been attacked by Russia.

“I talk a lot with my friends, with my family back in Ukraine, and it’s a horrible thing, but they are used to it now,” she said. “They are used to the alarms that are on. As soon as they hear something, they go to the bomb shelters. Sleepless nights. You know, it’s a terrible thing, but they tell me that now it’s a part of their life, which is very, very sad.”

Svitolina noted that she plays with a flag next to her name — unlike the Russians and Belarusians, who are allowed to play as neutral athletes.

“When I step on the court, I just try to think about the fighting spirit that all of us Ukrainians have and how Ukrainians are fighting for their values, for their freedom in Ukraine,” she said, “and me, I’m fighting here on my own front line.”

Svitolina said that she’s noticed “a lot of rubbish” concerning how tennis is reacting to the war.

“We have to focus on what the main point of what is going on,” she said. “Ukrainian people need help and need support. We are focusing on so many things like empty words, empty things that are not helping the situation, not helping anything.

“I want to invite everyone to focus on helping Ukrainians. That’s the main point of this, to help kids, to help women who lost their husbands because they are at the war, and they are fighting for Ukraine.

“You can donate. Couple of dollars might help and save lives. Or donate your time to something to help people.”

Also Wednesday, 108th-ranked Australian Thanasi Kokkinakis ousted three-time major champion Stan Wawrinka of Switzerland 3-6, 7-5, 6-3, 6-7 (4), 6-3 in four and a half hours. Wawrinka’s exit leaves Novak Djokovic as the lone man in the draw who has won the French Open and Djokovic and Carlos Alcaraz as the lone men left who have won any major.

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Marcell Jacobs still sidelined, misses another race with Fred Kerley

By OlympicTalkMay 31, 2023, 7:07 AM EDT

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Olympic 100m champion Marcell Jacobs of Italy will miss another scheduled clash with world 100m champion Fred Kerley, withdrawing from Friday’s Diamond League meet in Florence.

Jacobs, 28, has not recovered from the nerve pain that forced him out of last Sunday’s Diamond League meet in Rabat, Morocco, according to Italy’s track and field federation.

In his absence, Kerley’s top competition will be fellow American Trayvon Bromell, the world bronze medalist, and Kenyan Ferdinand Omanyala, the world’s fastest man this year at 9.84 seconds. Kerley beat both of them in Rabat.

The Florence Diamond League airs live on Peacock on Friday from 2-4 p.m. ET.

Jacobs has withdrawn from six scheduled head-to-heads with Kerley dating to May 2022 due to a series of health issues since that surprise gold in Tokyo.

Kerley, primarily a 400m sprinter until the Tokyo Olympic year, became the world’s fastest man in Jacobs’ absence. He ran a personal best 9.76 seconds, the world’s best time of 2022, at last June’s USA Track and Field Outdoor Championships. Then he led a U.S. sweep of the medals at July’s worlds.

Jacobs’ next scheduled race is a 100m at the Paris Diamond League on June 9. Kerley is not in that field, but world 200m champion Noah Lyles is.

The last time the reigning Olympic and world men’s 100m champions met in a 100m was the 2012 London Olympic final between Usain Bolt and Yohan Blake. From 2013 to 2017, Bolt held both titles, then retired in 2017 while remaining reigning Olympic champion until Jacobs’ win in Tokyo, where Kerley took silver.

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