Botswana’s Letsile Tebogo, US’ Kenneth Bednarek and US’ Noah Lyles cross the finish line to complete first, second and third respectively in the boys’s 200m final of the athletics event on the Paris 2024 Olympic Games at Stade de France in Saint-Denis, north of Paris, on August 8, 2024.
Odd Andersen | AFP | Getty Images
PARIS — Two days after Noah Lyles said he tested positive for Covid, the American sprinter finished third within the 200-meter final on the Paris Olympics, unable to chase down gold medalist Letsile Tebogo of Botswana.Â
Lyles ran 19.70 for bronze, behind Tebogo’s 19.46, which earned the primary gold medal in Botswana’s history. American Kenny Bednarek earned silver in 19.62.
Following his positive test, Lyles said he moved right into a hotel away from the Olympic Village to quarantine himself and arrived for warmups before Wednesday’s semifinal with a mask on. He said he never considered not competing in Thursday’s final and intentionally didn’t disclose details about his diagnosis.
“You never need to tell your competitors you are sick,” he said. “Why would you give them an edge over you?”
Lyles, 27, appeared his usual energetic self when he was introduced before the ultimate, jumping and sprinting down the track before moving into his blocks as a sold-out crowd inside Stade de France grew silent. Lyles was running from behind right from the beginning, looking little just like the sprinter who had won 26 consecutive races dating to 2021 until he finished second in Wednesday’s semifinal — also to Tebogo — and had been 38-5 all-time against the seven other sprinters in Thursday’s final.Â
On the finish line Lyles collapsed, then gingerly stood while asking for water and sitting back down on the track. He was put right into a wheelchair and carted off underneath the stadium. It was a stark contrast to Sunday night, when Lyles won the primary Olympic gold medal of his profession by winning the 100-meters by five-thousandths of a second and afterward guaranteed that he would win the 200 meters, as well.Â
US’ Noah Lyles reacts after competing in the boys’s 200m final of the athletics event on the Paris 2024 Olympic Games at Stade de France in Saint-Denis, north of Paris, on August 8, 2024.Â
Jewel Samad | AFP | Getty Images
Testing positive for COVID “definitely affected my performance,” Lyles said. “But I mean, to be honest, I’m more happy with myself than anything coming out and get the bronze medal with COVID in three days. It has been a wild Olympics.”
In an announcement, USA Track & Field said that it and the U.S. Olympic committee had adhered to guidelines set by the Centers for Disease Control and the International Olympic Committee to “prioritize his health, the wellbeing of our team, and the security of fellow competitors.”Â
“Our primary commitment is to make sure the security of Team USA athletes while upholding their right to compete. After a radical medical evaluation, Noah selected to compete tonight. We respect his decision and can proceed to watch his condition closely.”
Lyles was attempting to change into the primary man to brush each sprints at an Olympics since Jamaica’s Usain Bolt in 2016, and the primary from the U.S. since Carl Lewis 40 years ago. Earning bronze also ends Lyles’s much-discussed ambition of becoming the primary track athlete to win 4 gold medals at a single Olympics since 1984.
He said he would let USA Track & Field resolve whether he should run on the U.S. 4×100-meter relay team that qualified for Friday’s final with the fastest time in preliminaries.
