Dalilah Muhammad, who won gold in Rio and silver in Tokyo, finished sixth.
McLaughlin-Levrone is the defending gold medalist in the 400 hurdles, and nearly every time she lines up on the track she sets a new world record. She isn’t just the favorite in Paris but expected to win by a wide margin.
But she swears that each race she lowers her time, she's genuinely surprised, and grateful.
"I knew I was in 50-point high range, and it was just a matter of getting a stride pattern down," she said. "I knew the fitness was there. I was a little shocked that it came together with not the best stride pattern ... there’s still more we can work on."
That work, and the prospective results, motivate her.
McLaughlin-Levrone dreams of going sub-50 seconds and given her history, it doesn't seem like a stretch.
"It's really exciting, thinking how to improve upon history," she said. "That's always something I'm looking at."
She called the world record a "confidence booster" going into Paris.
Before the final, McLaughlin-Levrone’s coach, the legendary Bobby Kersee, encouraged her to “not be afraid to take it out, to trust my fitness coming home and just execute my 10 hurdles.”
“He’s always using boxing phrases,” McLaughlin-Levrone said. “So those were my Joe Frazier’s today, the 10 hurdles, just making sure I was focused on those. There was no time goal.”
And yes, in this analogy, McLaughlin-Levrone is Muhammad Ali, himself a former Olympian.
McLaughlin-Levrone will likely be on the 4x400 team as well; she ran the first leg of the relay at the Tokyo Games, leading the Americans to gold.
