World Athletics Championships 2025: McLaughlin-Levrone’s record-breaking run wins her gold in 400m; Lyles ‘ready’ for 200m final

When Sydney McLaughlin-Levrone powered though the final curve of the 400m final at the 2025 edition of the World Athletics Championships, she glanced to her right and saw something that hadn’t been there in a while.

Another runner.

She had a race on her hands.

The best way to explain how McLaughlin-Levrone became the first woman in nearly 40 years to crack the all-but-unscalable 48-second mark in the event is that the opponent she beat on Thursday night on a rain-glistened track in Tokyo, Marileidy Paulino, broke 48 seconds, too.

“You don’t run something like that without amazing women pushing you to it,” McLaughlin-Levrone said.

The final numbers in this one: McLaughlin-Levrone 47.78s. Paulino 47.98s.

They are the second and third fastest times in history, short only of the 47.60s by East Germany’s Marita Koch, set on October 6, 1985 — one of the last vestiges from an Eastern Bloc doping system that was exposed years after it ended, but too late for the records to be stripped from the books.

McLaughlin-Levrone, who stepped away from hurdles to see what she might be able to do in the 400m flat, said she was every bit as focused on winning the title in a new event as going after a record that had always been thought unapproachable.

And Paulino, the reigning Olympic and world champion in this event, wasn’t just going to give it away.

This was an even race, the likes of which McLaughlin-Levrone hadn’t been part of in at least three years in the hurdles, as the runners rounded the stretch. McLaughlin-Levrone opened a gap of about four body lengths with 30 meters left, but Paulino was actually gaining ground when they both lunged into the finish line.

“At the end of the day, this wasn’t my title to hold onto, it was mine to gain,” McLaughlin-Levrone said. “Bobby uses boxing terms all the time. He said, ’You’ve got to go out there and take the belt. It’s not yours. You’ve got to go earn it.’”

Bobby is Bobby Kersee, the wizardly coach who helped transform McLaughlin-Levrone into the greatest female hurdler ever and might be doing the same in the 400. Brutal training sessions with one-time UCLA quarter-miler Willington Wright were part of the regimen.

“I felt that somebody was going to have to run 47-something to win this,” Kersee told AP. “She trained for it. She took on the challenge, took on the risk. She’s just an amazing athlete that I can have no complaints about.”

Lyles lays down marker before final

Australian 17-year-old Gout Gout’s run through the 200m ended with a fourth-place finish in his semifinal heat in a time of 20.36 seconds.

Not a bad debut at the Worlds considering he’s still in high school.

“The biggest eye-opener is knowing that I can compete at the young age I am against the best men in the world,” Gout said.

The Australian record-setter, who draws comparisons to Usain Bolt, insists the future is bright. The 2032 Olympics will be in Brisbane.

“I’m just a kid right now, and I know that if I can do this at 17, I can do this at 25 and I’ll be even better at 25 than I was at 17,” he said.

What was the message behind Noah Lyles running the season’s best time, a 19.51, in the 200-meter semifinals?

“It tells me I was stupid enough to run 19.5 in the semis,” Lyles said after beating the next-best time in the semifinal round by more than a quarter of a second.

Part of the art of running through the rounds is to not use up too much energy early.

Lyles didn’t appear concerned about that, as he heads into a final that will include the three main characters in the 200-meter drama — himself, Kenny Bednarek and Letsile Tebogo.

“I’m in shape,” Lyles said. “I’ll probably be screaming from my hotel room for my massage. But I’ll be ready.”

Walcott completes collection

Keshorn Walcott was the Olympic gold medalist in the javelin 13 years ago in London, and a bronze medalist four years later in the Rio de Janeiro Games.

But it’s been been a struggle ever since for him to shine again on the big stage — until Thursday.

Walcott, from Trinidad and Tobago, won the World Championship in Tokyo with a throw of 88.16m, his best of the season.

Anderson Peters of Grenada — a two-time world champion — took silver (87.38m) and Curtis Peterson of the United States the bronze (86.67m).

Walcott laughed when asked about his absence from major podiums.

“Where have I been? I’ve been trying. That’s where I’ve been,” he said. “I’ve been trying to attain this medal for 13 years. I’ve been here man. It’s been a long 13 years. And tonight is finally my night once again.”

He said the medal completed his collection alongside the Olympic gold.

Published on Sep 18, 2025