Breakout star Sha'Carri Richardson: How the 100m world champion reinvented herself

In many ways, it’s strange to say that 2023 was a breakout year for 23-year-old US sprinter Sha’Carri Richardson.

This is, after all, an athlete who has been re-writing the record books since she was a teen, including setting the fastest collegiate 100m mark in history at age 19 with a time of 10.75 seconds that also made her the ninth-fastest woman ever.

But have no doubts about it, this was the year that Richardson announced herself to the world - not as a contender but arguably as the number one female sprinter on the planet today.

The American’s victory in the 100m at the World Athletics Championships flew in the face of so much recent history that The Times used the word ‘shock’ in the headline of their race report.

It’s the same word the Guardian chose just 14 months earlier when the athlete was knocked out of the first round of the 2022 US trials to scupper her chances of competing in a World Championships on her home soil.

But in 2023 Richardson has been a different prospect since the season started. She has re-invented herself on the track in ways some thought unthinkable.

Her now-famous statement "I'm not back, I'm better" has become a symbol of her performances throughout this breakout year, where she has confounded expectations by becoming arguably the biggest star in US athletics today.

And she now stands on top of the world as the USA’s first women’s 100m world champion since the late Tori Bowie in 2017 and only the second non-Jamaican since Carmelita Jeter in 2011.

Sha’Carri Richardson and the interruption of Jamaican sprint dominance

It was no surprise to see that the two athletes standing next to Richardson on the 100m podium in Budapest both hailed from the Caribbean island of Jamaica.

Of the last nine World Athletics Championships 100m gold medal winners, six of them have been Jamaicans.

However, even that number is slightly misleading when you see that five of the last eight titles have belonged to one woman only - the great Shelly-Ann Fraser-Pryce.

In 2023, small chinks have appeared in the armour of Fraser-Pryce, who had looked unstoppable throughout near enough the entirety of last season.

Early this year, the 36-year-old suffered a knee injury that disrupted her ability to train and race, stating as recently as July that she was: “not at 100 per cent.”

But Jamaica are blessed with an enviable depth of sprinting talent and, with one legend struggling, another stepped up to take her place as the favourite for the World Championships 100m race: Shericka Jackson.

Jackson was the second fastest member of the Jamaican 100m sweep that had stunned the US crowds at home at the Oregon 2022 Worlds.

But this year, the fastest 200m runner alive today had brought her a-game to the shorter sprint, registering a world lead of 10.65 seconds in July to make her the favourite for gold in Budapest.

Richardson, whose personal best was 10.71 before the Worlds, had never even run close to that time.

So how would she cope when form and history were not on her side?

The young American’s answer was emphatic as she burst from the blocks in the outside lane and sprinted to victory in a new PB of 10.65. Jackson could not keep up, Fraser-Pryce settled for bronze and Richardson had made history at the Worlds.

“I wanted my performance to be all the words I needed to speak myself,” Richardson told World Athletics just after the race. “It feels amazing, it feels like everything has paid off and I’m grateful.”

Sha’Carri Richardson’s 2023 season: a lesson in consistency and growth

While the world will remember Richardson’s stunning gold medal run in Budapest, the real secret to her success this year has been consistency and development.

Of the eight fastest 100m times of 2023, Richardson owns five, with the earliest of those coming back in May when she ran 10.76 with the outdoor season still in its infancy.

The difference is stark when compared to just a year earlier, where Richardson’s best 2022 time of 10.85 put her only 32nd highest on that year’s list and the athlete only registered three times in the top 100.

Her disappointment was perhaps most stark when she came home last in the 2022 Prefontaine Classic - the same race that will define the Diamond League champions this year that she now enters as favourite.

Still, even with her disappointment, Richardson showed just how much the sport means to her as she defiantly defended her own love for athletics and ability to perform.

“I’m a warrior,” she said after the race. “My passion will always come out for my love for what it is I put my blood, sweat, tears and sacrifice into. This last month was a journey for me, but that’s no excuse because at the end of the day I’m an athlete and today was the day, but it’s not every day. It’s not the end of the world and if you choose to count me out, the joke’s on you.”

Unlike in previous years, where the American has shone brightly but struggled to hold onto any rhythm throughout the season, 2023 has seen Richardson peak at the optimal time.

Her 10.65 at the Worlds was a true champion’s performance as she pulled out her very best when it mattered most.

Casting a deeper look at 2023, you can see that of her top five times this year, four have come between July and August and eight of her top 10 also arrived during the month prior to, or of the, World Athletics Championships.

This is, without any shadow of a doubt, an athlete in the ascendancy - and with Paris 2024 less than a year away, a true threat to anyone with aspirations to become Olympic 100m champion.

Nobody is counting Richardson out anymore.

How does Sha’Carri Richardson stack up against the fastest of all time: Florence Griffith-Joyner?

At 23, Richardson is still in the fledgling years of her athletics career, and while it’s difficult to measure potential, it’s not unimaginable that she could yet achieve what so many athletes have tried - and failed - before her: break the 35-year-old 100m record of Florence Griffith-Joyner.

Flo-Jo’s mark of 10.49 still stands alone in the world of track & field, even as the competition has ramped up considerably over the past years.

She remains the only woman ever to have dipped under 10.50 and leads a list of athletes that includes double Olympic 100m and 200m champion Elaine Thompson-Herah in second (10.54), Fraser-Pryce in third (10.60) and another American Jeter in fourth (10.64).

Richardson’s best time sees her sit joint-fifth on the all-time list alongside Marion Jones and her greatest rival today Shericka Jackson, yet she is by far the youngest and most inexperienced of the athletes competing today.

While much has been made of Fraser-Pryce’s continued brilliance racing in her late thirties, her fellow Jamaicans Thompson-Herah (31) and Shericka Jackson (29) also have years of training and competition behind them that have enabled them to progress to the level they compete at today.

Flo-Jo was also 28 when she raced her fastest 100m time - five whole seasons more experienced than Richardson is today.

But if the young American can continue her trajectory - and re-invention - in the world of athletics, track fans may well be talking less about medals and more about just how close she can come to breaking the longstanding and legendary world record of Flo-Jo herself.

Richardson served a one-month suspension in 2021 after testing positive for cannabis during the U.S. trials. Cannabis is a banned substance per World Anti-Doping Agency rules.