By Scott Cacciola, New York Times

Noah Lyles, the brash American with dreams of Olympic gold in Paris, rarely cedes the spotlight.

He is, after all, the biggest star in what historically has been track and field’s most high-profile event, the men’s 100-meter dash. But before the Olympic final Sunday, he is also enough of a realist to acknowledge that the race no longer has the cachet it once did.

It might not even be the premier event in the sport anymore. Even Lyles, who doubled as the 100- and 200-meter champion at last year’s world championships, conceded as much at a meet in London a few weeks ago.

“I think the 400 hurdles, men and women, are definitely trying to take it,” Lyles said.

The men’s 100 is steeped in history. Past winners include some of the most luminous figures in Olympic track history: Jesse Owens. Carl Lewis. Bob Hayes. Usain Bolt.

Other former winners, such as Ben Johnson, who was famously stripped of his gold medal in 1988, and Justin Gatlin, whose win in 2004 was later tainted by a doping suspension, are forever linked to infamy.

Either way, the 100 has long had an allure. The story of the last time the event was held in Paris, after all, produced not just a gold medal for Harold Abrahams but four Academy Awards for the film about his triumph, “Chariots of Fire.”

It was inevitable that the event would suffer from a bit of a vacuum after Bolt retired in 2017, as the most decorated sprinter in history and the winner of the 100 (and the 200) at three consecutive Olympics from 2008 to 2016. Bolt’s 100-meter world record of 9.58 seconds from 2009 remains untouched. (He also owns the 200 world record.)

The thing about Bolt, though, was that his charisma matched his talent. He possessed a sort of magnetic energy whenever he stepped on the track. He was must-see TV, his popularity transcending the relatively niche world of track and field.

“He was a once-in-a-generation star,” Ato Boldon, an NBC analyst and four-time Olympic medalist, said in a telephone interview. “So, no, it’s not the same sort of oh-my-gosh-you-have-to-see-this-guy-before-he-retires type of energy.”

In his absence, athletes in other events have emerged as headliners. In the men’s 1,500-meter race, Jakob Ingebrigtsen of Norway and Josh Kerr of Britain are worthy of their own telenovela. They do not care for each other, which makes for compelling theater.

Consider, too, the 400-meter hurdles. On the men’s side, Rai Benjamin of the United States, Karsten Warholm of Norway and Alison dos Santos of Brazil have combined to run the 17 fastest times in history. Among the women, Sydney McLaughlin-Levrone of the United States and Femke Bol of the Netherlands are pushing the event to new levels. McLaughlin-Levrone, who is on billboards across Paris, holds the world record. Bol is the world champion.

And any list of marquee track and field events in Paris would be incomplete without a mention of the women’s 100, where American star Sha’Carri Richardson won the silver medal Saturday.

“I look at where Sha’Carri’s star is now,” Boldon said before Saturday’s race, “and I go, ‘Woo-hoo!’ Can you imagine if Sha’Carri wins the first 100-meter gold in the Olympics for the United States since 1996, and then she has four years of hype leading into 2028 Games in Los Angeles?”

The men’s and women’s 100 were the focus of the first season of “Sprint,” Netflix’s behind-the-scenes docuseries that detailed the lives of several sprinters through last year’s world championships in Budapest, Hungary. Richardson and Lyles were front and center. The producers did not choose the 100 on a whim. They chose it because of its mystique and its accessibility.

“Everyone gets being the fastest man or woman in the world,” said Jon Ridgeon, CEO of World Athletics. “It’s pretty sexy. But we’ve got a wonderful array of disciplines, and wouldn’t it be great to feature some other disciplines going forward?”

In Paris, Lyles seems determined to keep at least some of the attention on himself. True to form, he scoffed theatrically last month in London when he was asked about vying for Olympic gold against Kishane Thompson and Thompson’s Jamaican teammates. (Thompson has the fastest 100 time in the world this year.)

“I beat everybody else that I touch,” Lyles said, stoking a rivalry that his event could probably use. “I don’t see why they’re any different.”

This article originally appeared in The New York Times.

Source: wralsportsfan.com