Lyles wins Olympic 100m gold in closest finish in modern history

The Manila Times

Lyles wins Olympic 100m gold in closest finish in modern history  A phone call with his therapist after a worrying semi-final helped propel Noah Lyles to the top of the Olympic podium on Sunday, after years of rebuilding his mental health to reach the pinnacle of his sport.  The American put on the performance of a lifetime to take the 100 meters gold by five-thousandths of a second in 9.79, in a blistering final where a 9.91 from Jamaican Oblique Seville was only good enough to finish last.  Seville had crossed the line ahead of Lyles in their semi-final, and the US sprinter said he needed to get into the right mindset for his medal race.  IOC / REUTERS VIDEO  Subscribe to The Manila Times Channel - https://tmt.ph/YTSubscribe  Visit our website at https://www.manilatimes.net    Follow us:  Facebook - https://tmt.ph/facebook  Instagram - https://tmt.ph/instagram  Twitter - https://tmt.ph/twitter  DailyMotion - https://tmt.ph/dailymotion    Subscribe to our Digital Edition - https://tmt.ph/digital    Check out our Podcasts:  Spotify - https://tmt.ph/spotify  Apple Podcasts - https://tmt.ph/applepodcasts  Amazon Music - https://tmt.ph/amazonmusic  Deezer: https://tmt.ph/deezer  Tune In: https://tmt.ph/tunein   #TheManilaTimes  #worldnews  #paris2024  #olympics

Transcript

00:00I wouldn't say nervous. I'd say I was extremely curious to what was going to happen.

00:05That's how me and my therapist phrase it. I'm curious to what I'm going to do.

00:11How am I going to pull this off, basically? Situations like that. Because easily, you know,

00:15I came in third fastest, you know, from the semis. I'm like, you know, this is going to be serious.

00:21This is not going to be easy. And I like said, okay, my therapist said, you need to let go.

00:28You need to relax. You need to be yourself. And I watched as we were all going out.

00:34Salt-N-Chain hit the yell. I'm like, dang, that's my thing. That's crazy. Man,

00:39it's hitting the Super Saiyan. Yeah, that's crazy. All right. I guess I got to do another thing.

00:44So I was like, all right, I'm not stopping at this, you know, little point. You know,

00:48I'm running out into the crowd because this crowd was some crowd that really wanted the

00:52energy to back behind. I'm like, they would give me the energy that I'm looking for.

00:55Came up, we were waiting for the names to pop up. And I'm going to be honest, I came over,

00:59I was like, I think you got that one, big dog. You know, he was out there in lane four and I

01:04was in lane seven. I couldn't really see what was going on over there. So I just had to keep,

01:08you know, running like I was going to win it. And, you know, something said I need to lean.

01:13And I was like, I'm going to lean because, you know, it was that type of race. And it was crazy

01:17as my, you know, Ralph Mann was like, before I left for the Paris, he's like, this is how close

01:23first and second is going to be away from each other. And I can't believe how right he was.

01:28Yeah, pretty much the same thing that Noah said. It was really a close race, you know,

01:32because I couldn't really see Noah based on the lane that we were in. So I saw that I cleared

01:40to my near left and my near right, but I couldn't see him. It was that close. So when we both

01:44crossed the line, as he said, he came to me and said, hey man, I think you got it. But I was like,

01:50wow. And I'm not even sure because it was that close. Like I said, I did think that

01:55Keshane had that. And I was like, oh man, I'm really going to have to swallow my pride,

02:02which I don't have a problem doing. Respect deserves respect. And, you know, everybody

02:05on this, everybody in the field, to be honest, came out knowing that they could win this race.

02:11And, you know, that's the mindset that we have to have, you know, iron sharpens iron, of course.

02:16And when I saw my name, I was like, I didn't do this against a slow crowd or a field. I did this

02:21against the best of the best on the biggest stage with the biggest pressure. And seeing that name,

02:26I was like, oh my gosh, there it is. And I wasn't even entered in the hundred in 2021. So that was,

02:32you know, here I am first Olympics in the hundred, you know, going around now the Olympic champion

02:39and, you know, having that title of not just at world championships, but at the Olympics of

02:44world's fastest man.

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