The fastest woman on the planet is from Dallas and graduated from Carter.
Fun to say, yeah? It also happens to be true, after Sha’Carri Richardson was crowned world champion in the 100-meter dash yesterday in Budapest.
If you know the name, you’re familiar with the story. Two years ago, Richardson was on the precipice of becoming one of the stars of the Tokyo Olympics, only to test positive for marijuana—still a banned substance according to United States Anti-Doping Agency—after the Olympic trials. Richardson never hid from the positive test, admitting to using the substance in the wake of her biological mother recently passing away, and she wound up missing the games due to the resulting one-month suspension.
There also wound up being a very intense discourse concerning whether weed should even be considered performance-enhancing in a sport involving extremely fast reaction speeds, which entangled everyone from randos on the internet all the way up to the president of the United States. The whole thing was an enormous bummer.
Richardson was only 21 back then, which left plenty of time for her to come back, get even faster, and cram many, many more medals in her trophy case. Hence her mantra from this track season: “I’m not back. I’m better.”
She’s exactly right, ripping off a career-best 10.65 in yesterday’s final, which involved four of the eight fastest woman sprinters in history:
That 10.65 also happened to be the best time ever in a world final, as well as tying for the fastest time in a race this year with runner-up Shericka Jackson, whom Richardson is 3-0 against this year.
Add it all up, and the 23-year-old is the early favorite to take home the Olympic golds next year in Paris that she didn’t have a chance to compete for last time around. And in the here and now, she’s firmly in the conversation for the very best athlete Dallas has to offer.
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