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During every Olympic Games, lesser-known professional athletes are catapulted into household names overnight. Typically, they have to win medals. Other times, their personalities are enough to build their own fandoms. Heading into this summer’s Olympics in Paris, Noah Lyles expects to be recognized for both.
If you don’t follow track and field, you may not be familiar with Lyles — although his name could soon become inescapable. Already, the new Netflix docuseries Sprint, set around the 2023 World Athletics Championships in Budapest, has shone a bigger spotlight on him. The six-part series follows track and field’s brightest stars in the 100- and 200-meter sprints, including the fastest woman on Earth, Sha’Carri Richardson; Jamaican gold medalist Shericka Jackson; and British record-holder in the 100 and 200 meters, Zharnel Hughes. Despite this star power, the series’s main attraction has been Lyles, whose ambitions to outrun retired legend Usain Bolt have ruffled some feathers.
Many of Lyles’s soundbites in Sprint have been perceived by viewers as arrogant. In one scene, he says that to be a successful athlete, “you have to have the mindset of a God.” “I’m a true believer in that the moment isn’t bigger than me, the moment was made for me,” he says in another. Compare this attitude to Shericka Jackson’s. When asked by someone off-camera about claims that she’s the best in the sport, she refused to comment. Meanwhile, others seem confused about Lyles’s claim to “the fastest man in the world” title while Bolt is still living. Still, much like Richardson, his bravado, personal style, and penchant for trash-talking has given Americans someone to place their bets on at the upcoming Olympics.
Currently, Lyles holds the title of the fastest man in the world after winning the 100 and 200 meters — also known as the sprint double — at last year’s World Championships. (He ran the 100 meter in 9.83 seconds and the 200 meter in 19.52.) Altogether, he holds six world titles. He also earned the bronze medal in the 200 meter at the 2020 Olympics in Tokyo, a disappointing result that he says inspired his lofty goals at this year’s games. Not only does he want to beat Bolt’s record times, he plans to take home four gold medals.
Whether he can actually achieve this feat is anyone’s guess. Regardless, it seems like he’ll leave this year’s Olympics having achieved another career goal — having everyone talk about him.
Lyles may have his critics, but it’s all part of his mythmaking
When we think of celebrity athletes whose fame extends beyond their sport, sprinters aren’t exactly the first people to come to mind. While Bolt has practically become synonymous with running, it’s fair to say the sport doesn’t offer its athletes the same level of visibility that the NBA, for example, offers even its most unassuming players. For instance, it took a drug-test scandal — coming up positive for marijuana, not performance-enhancing drugs — and her subsequent suspension from the Tokyo Olympics for Richardson to become a national talking point and a currently beloved underdog.
Lyles wants this to change. “You have all these other athletes as stars, rockstars, popular wherever they go,” he says in the first episode of Sprint. “Track and field needs to be the same.”
The 26-year-old has certainly been doing his part to bring attention to the sport, or maybe just to himself. While he doesn’t represent the most head-turning style in track and field right now — that may belong to Richardson with her occasionally flame-colored hair, numerous tattoos, and Flo Jo-esque acrylics — he frequently shows up to meets in snazzy, designer looks, like F1 champion Lewis Hamilton or one of a handful of NBA stars. Also in the spirit of ’80s icon Florence Griffith Joyner, he even enjoys a flashy manicure. His accomplishments, thus far, have also gotten him a few magazine covers, most recently Time, and an extremely lucrative contract for a track star with Adidas.
On social media, he delivers the same high-quality, fashion-forward content of a major influencer. (In Sprint, he refers to himself as an “artistic director.”) On his Instagram (@nojo18), where he’s approaching a million followers, you’re just as likely to see high-res photos of his pre-meet fits, posts with Snoop Dogg, and wardrobe selections inspired by his favorite anime as you are content related to track. He also posts playful videos with his girlfriend, fellow runner Junelle Bromfield, the pair seeming to be a power couple in the making.
On his way to becoming America’s most beloved track star, though, Lyles has already rubbed some sports fans the wrong way. In an interview following his World Championship wins last year, he questioned why NBA Finals winners are referred to as “world champions.” “World champions of what?” he asked at a post-meet conference.“The United States?” Soon came a pile of responses from NBA players, including Kevin Durant, Aaron Gordon, and Devin Booker denouncing his comments. Drake, a supporter of the Toronto Raptors, even chimed in, poking fun at Lyles. Others, like Ghanaian sports journalist Gary Al-Smith, said Lyles was simply observing a larger problem of American exceptionalism in basketball.
Ironically, Lyles has been accused of displaying the same superior, culturally American attitude in his own sport. On the fourth episode of Sprint, Lyles discussed the backlash he received after he posted his predicted times in the 100 meter and 200 meter at last year’s World Championships on Instagram, which he ultimately fell short of, despite taking home the gold. “What the heck does me saying my goal have to do with you?” he asks in a talking-head interview. It’s a good question, considering that it’s every athlete’s goal to perform at their best and destroy their opponents, whether or not they vocalize it as much as Lyles does. Fans’ negative responses to this sort of behavior have also confused Richardson, who says in the docuseries that there should be “more trash-talking” in the sport.
This poor reception online can at least be partially explained by a heated rivalry between American and Jamaican sprinters that intensified at the 2008 Beijing Olympics where Bolt won the gold in the 100 meter and 200 meter, while achieving record times in both sprints. Jamaican track stars Shelly Ann-Frazer and Veronica Campbell-Brown also won the 100 meter and 200 meter, respectively. More than any athlete, though, Bolt has become a national symbol and icon in Jamaica, where track and field is the dominant sport. Announcing your plans to overthrow him, as Lyles has done, expectedly has some repercussions.
All eyes are on Lyles at the Paris Olympics
Since the US claims both the fastest man and woman in the world right now, one can assume an even larger number of American viewers will be tuned in to track this year, and there’s a lot at stake for Lyles’s reputation.
Historically, the Olympics have been fraught territory for the runner. In 2020, fans witnessed the emotional toll that training for and competing at the Olympics has had on Lyles, and how he handles disappointment when he’s fallen short of his goals. After landing in third place in the 200 meter in Tokyo, Lyles broke down during a post-meet interview with the Washington Post. Tears started to fall when talking about his brother, Josephus Lyles, another professional sprinter, who failed to qualify for the Olympics that year. He spoke about his mental health and his journey with antidepressants leading up to the Olympics, as well as his experience marching alongside his brother in 2020’s Black Lives Matter protests, and the pressure he feels as a Black American athlete and a Black American man.
“I knew there were a lot of people out there like me who were too scared to say something or start that journey,” he said. “I wanted them to know if you guys see me in a big light, I want you to know that it’s okay not to feel good and you can go out and talk to somebody … This is a serious issue.”
Now, following a double-sprint win at the World Championships, Lyles is displaying more confidence than ever. During a recent appearance on The Tonight Show, Lyles took the opportunity to tell the country what he planned to achieve in Paris. For one thing, he wants to beat Bolt, who holds the top two times in the 100-meter dash at 9.63 and 9.69 seconds. But he also wants to take home four gold medals. “It’s not just good enough to be faster than that,” Lyles told Fallon. “You also have to have the medals to go with it.”
In addition to taking home the gold in the 100 and 200 meter, Lyles wants to win in the 4×100 and 4×400 meter relays. It wouldn’t be the first time an American sprinter nabbed four gold medals at one Olympics. For instance, Jesse Owens, Alvin Kraenzlein, and Carl Lewis have each won four. Their wins included the long jump, however; Lyles would be making history for those four sprints. Beyond any potential medals, the energy surrounding him and Richardson feels like a new era for American track stars, one defined by attitude and swagger. If Lyles can impress the world with his personality, he’ll at least have achieved half of his goals.
