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Sydney McLaughlin-Levrone once reflected on how she considered returning to her college coach, Edrick Floreal, as she faced challenges with her hurdling technique. While she had recognized issues even before the 2019 World Athletics Championships, the break caused by the COVID-19 pandemic gave her space to reflect on her training decisions.
Although she acknowledged progress under coach Joanna Hayes, McLaughlin-Levrone admitted she still felt her technique wasn’t where it needed to be. As a result, she thought about ways to address the problem more effectively.
While she saw Floreal as a potential solution, she also recalled the difficulties she faced during her freshman year at college, including frustrations and interpersonal tensions, which made her hesitant to return to that environment. In her memoir Far Beyond Gold: Running from Fear to Faith, released in January 2024, Sydney McLaughlin-Levrone shared her thoughts on thinking about her return to the former University of Kentucky track and field coach, adding:
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“Now I had more than a year to fix my hurdles problem. At the time, I still didn’t know how I was going to do that…My inability to figure out the hurdles frustrated me so much, I considered doing something I told myself I’d never do: go back to my college program. Coach Flo was now leading the University of Texas track program, but he still coached a stable of elite runners. I didn’t really want to go back. It had taken such a toll on me the first time. But he’d gotten results.”
However, she eventually chose Bobby Kersee as her coach, with whom she began training during the pandemic. Their first contest together as an athlete-coach duo was in an unfamiliar event to the American runner as she raced the 60m hurdles at the 2021 New Balance Indoor Grand Prix.
Under Kersee’s guidance, Sydney McLaughlin-Levrone achieved remarkable success by becoming a four-time gold medalist at the Olympics and breaking the world record in the 400m hurdles on six occasions.
Sydney McLaughlin-Levrone set to represent USA in 400m at World Athletics Championships 2025
Sydney McLaughlin-Levrone, the 400m hurdles world record holder, will be representing the United States in the 400m flat event at the 2025 World Athletics Championships, scheduled in Tokyo from September 13 to 21. This comes after she finished first in the discipline at the USA Track and Field Championships on August 2.
She recorded an impressive performance of 48.90s at the nationals, which was well ahead of her competitors, including Isabella Whittaker and Aaliyah Buttler, who clocked times of 49.59s and 49.91s respectively to finish second and third. Earlier, in the heats, the four-time Olympic champion had registered a 49.59s run to top Heat three. Notably, the event didn’t have a semi-final round.
With that, McLaughlin-Levrone is considered one of the strongest competitors in the 400m who will be competing at the World Athletics Championships. Some of the other athletes who are likely to pose a strong competition to her are Marileidy Paulino and Salwa Eid Naser. Both Paulino and Naser emerged as the gold and silver medalists at last year’s Paris Olympics in the discipline.
