Jamaican sprinter Elaine Thompson-Herah, five-time Olympic champion notably in the 100m and 200m, did not participate in the Jamaican selections due to an injury and therefore renounces the Paris 2024 Olympics.
Jamaican Elaine Thompson-Herah, double Olympic gold medalist in the 100 and 200m, will not participate in the Paris Games due to an Achilles tendon injury, she announced on Wednesday. “I’m hurt and devastated to miss the Olympics this year, but at the end of the day it’s about sport and my health comes first,” Thompson-Herah, 31, wrote in a statement posted to social media social. The sprint star had already given up on participating in the half-lap in Paris, and had initially only registered for the 100m for the Olympic selections scheduled for June 27 to 30 in Kingston.
She will continue her career
During her last race at the beginning of the month, in New York, Elaine Thompson-Herah finished last in the 100m, in 11″48, far from her performance and the winner, the Nigerian Favor Ofili (11″18). She had to be carried off the track and returned to the locker room in the arms of two other people, grimacing, without making a statement. She said Wednesday that she immediately realized the severity of her injury.
“I sat on the ground because I couldn’t put any pressure on my leg while I was being carried off the track,” she wrote. A medical examination then revealed a “small tear” in the Achilles tendon, she said. “I returned home with the firm intention of continuing to push and prepare for the national trials, in order to have another chance to participate in my third Olympic Games, but my leg did not allow me to do so,” she regretted.
Despite the setback, she said she would continue her sprinting career. “It’s a long road, but I’m ready to start again, keep working, make a full recovery and resume my track career,” she wrote. Thompson-Herah has never won individual sprint gold at the world athletics championships, but she has been dazzling in the Olympic arena. Her 100m personal best of 10.54 – set in Eugene, Oregon, in August 2021 – is the second-fastest time in history, just behind Florence Griffith-Joyner’s world record of 10.49 set in 1988.
