On September 18th, 2025, Sydney McLaughlin-Levrone took lane 5 at the World Championships for the women’s 400m race and proceeded to run the second-fastest 400m time ever. In fact, she was only 0.18 seconds behind breaking the record altogether. As a usual hurdler, Sydney completed the race in 47.78 seconds in rainy Tokyo conditions, which is especially impressive because her 400m hurdle time at the Olympics was only 2.59 seconds slower than her flat time. Statistically speaking, most people’s regular flat time versus their hurdle time is usually four to five seconds slower, but Sydney is not a normal human being.
Sydney just recently decided to make the switch from her usual event, the 400m hurdles, to the 400m flat at the Tokyo World Championships earlier this month, where she won her first Olympic gold medal in 2021 after barely turning 22 a couple of days before. In an interview, stating, “But honestly, I just want to be the best track athlete I can be. If that means it takes time to get faster in the 400, if it takes years, I want to work to do that.” She originally began her preparations to compete in the flat 400 in 2023, but shortly after, a knee injury delayed the process, leading to her pulling her name from the World Championships that year.
Later in that same interview, Sydney stated, “It’s definitely something I knew I wanted to come back to. I’ve loved the idea of stepping out into different events, challenging myself, pushing myself, seeing if I can be the best well-rounded athlete I can before I hang up my spikes…” She already holds the world record in the 400m hurdles and now adds the 400m flat American record to her arsenal. The overall world record is held by Marita Koch, a German runner who set the record in Canberra, Australia, on October 6, 1985. To even come close to holding one of the 36 records at the World Championships is incredibly impressive; to win both the 400m flat and the 400m hurdles is just as impressive.
Just later that same weekend on Sunday, September 21st, Sydney anchored for the 4x400m women’s relay for the USA, running a 47.82 split alongside Isabella Whittaker, Lynna Irby-Jackson, who ran a 48.71-second leg, and Aaliyah Butler. This group altogether ran a record-breaking and setting time of 3:16.61, beating the U.S. women’s previous record of 3:16.71 that was set in 1993 in Stuttgart, Germany. Ultimately leading to the U.S.A. winning yet another gold medal in this event, making this their 11th title out of the last 17.
Sydney has quite the list of accolades at only 26 years old. She holds four Olympic gold medals in both in the 400m hurdles and 4x400m relay at the 2020 and 2024 Olympics. As well as four gold medals at the World Championships in the 400m hurdles, two in the 4x400m relay, and 400m flat, in 2022 and 2025. Sydney also holds two world records for the 400m hurdles, breaking the previous records multiple times, and two national records for the 400m hurdles and 400m flat. She was also awarded the World Athletics Female Athlete of the Year in 2024, the Laureus World Sportswoman of the Year nominee, and she won the Gatorade Female Athlete of the Year twice for the 2015-16 and 2016-17 school years.
