In case you don’t know who Sha’Carri Richardson is, she just beat the record of the fastest woman in the world.
To go more in-depth with who Sha’Carri is, let’s go back to 2019. She was a freshman at Louisiana State University and she made headlines when she broke the National Collegiate Athletic Association Championships record for the 100m, running 10.75 seconds. She was 19 years old at the time and then held the title of one of the top ten fastest women in history. Following that, four days later, she announced she was going to sign a professional contract and began training with former Olympic sprinter, Dennis Mitchell.
After that, she qualified for the 2020 Summer Olympics with her 100-meter time (10.86 seconds) during her trial run, beating out Javianne Oliver by 0.13 seconds. However, she had to submit a urine test and it came back that she had smoked cannabis, which put her acceptance to the Olympics in jeopardy. She was told to attend a month-long counseling program, and accept a one-month suspension. Both were completed by Sha’Carri; however, the suspension ended on July 27, which made her ineligible for the Olympic 100-meter competition. She could have run the 4 x 100 relay but did not get selected for the team.
This began to create a conversation among everyone. People weren’t sure if this was an appropriate response to her situation, considering it was after she had qualified and it is not stated that she was under the influence during her trials. This conversation led to President Biden saying the athletic drug testing regulations should be changed, and as a result the World Anti-Doping Agency announced they would review the regulation. Following all of this, Javianne Oliver then replaced Sha’Carri’s position on the USA Olympic team that year.
On Tuesday, Aug. 30, 2022, Sha’Carri raced against Elaine Thompson-Herah, the Olympic champion of Jamaica, in a 100-meter dash while in Switzerland. Sha’Carri was able to beat Elaine despite the rain and wet track due to the poor weather conditions. Sha’Carri won by .01 second, with a finishing time of 11.29 seconds. This was an incredible win for Sha’Carri, especially considering that she hadn’t raced since June 26, 2022, when she did not qualify for the finals at the US Championship in Eugene, Ore. There has been an outpour of support for her over multiple platforms following this victorious win. I, personally, cannot wait to see all of her future accomplishments and hope to see her back in the positive headlines again.