Sha’Carri Richardson Wins 100-Meters to Make Her First Olympic Team
The sprinter is considered Team USA’s biggest hope for a medal in Tokyo. She shared her biggest moment with her grandmother.
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Sha’Carri Richardson has captured the attention of track and field fans everywhere for her lightning fast talent, of course, but also for her constantly changing hair color and fiery personality. On Saturday she earned another reason to demand notice: winning the 2021 U.S. Olympic Trials 100-meters, in 10.86.
Javianne Oliver was second and Teahna Daniels finished third to round out the Olympics-bound team.
After crossing the finish line, Richardson ran up the stands at Hayward Field, in Eugene, Oregon, with an NBC camera crew trying to keep up, to where her family was sitting and had a long, emotional embrace with her grandmother.
“My grandmother’s my heart, my grandmother is my superwoman, so to be able to just have her here at the biggest meet of my life and be able to cross the finish line and right up those steps knowing I’m an Olympian now, it just felt amazing,” Richardson, 21, said. “Honestly that probably felt better than winning the race.”
"I'm highly blessed and grateful… My family is my everything. My everything until the day I'm done."
Sha'Carri Richardson with so many emotions after earning a spot on the U.S. Olympic Team.@usatf | #TrackFieldTrials21 x #TokyoOlympics pic.twitter.com/8ujBpBSwVC
— #TokyoOlympics (@NBCOlympics) June 20, 2021
In her post-race interview on the broadcast, Richardson, who is from Dallas and said that the win came after she learned this week of her biological mother’s death.
“I am grateful for her giving me life, bringing me into this world…I will always love and respect her for that and definitely pay her respect every time I step on the track,” Richardson said.
The last time the United States won Olympic gold in the 100 meters was in 1996, when Gail Devers won her second. Richards has run the six fastest times in the world in 2021.
The Trials continue on Sunday with the first round of the women’s 3,000-meter steeplechase, a race that will go on without Colleen Quigley, who announced on Saturday that she will not compete at the Trials.