At just 17, this girl made the Olympic team! But was it worth it? Heck yeah! Sydney McLaughlin-Levrone didn’t just show up at the Olympics, she took over. Since 2019, she’s been breaking records. At the Paris Olympics, she tore through the 400-meter hurdles in 50.37, and in doing so, she shattered the world record six times! Yep, she’s got skills. Now, at 25, she’s a household name. But despite all the hype, she’s as humble as ever. After winning her third Olympic gold, she said, “I credit all that I do to God. He’s given me a gift. ” But seriously, how did it feel the first time she broke the world record?

Sydney McLaughlin-Levrone has always been eager to push herself, even when the challenges seem impossible. By the time she was 23, she had already captured Olympic and world titles, and by 2022, she was smashing her own world records. At the World Championships in Eugene, Oregon, that year, she broke the 400m hurdles world record again with a 50.68-second finish, becoming the first woman to break the 51-second barrier. It was a moment of pure triumph, but it came with a lot of physical pain. Reason: it was the result of pushing through extreme exhaustion and discomfort.

Right after the race, some spectators misinterpreted her subdued reaction as disinterest. But McLaughlin-Levrone was far from indifferent—she was completely spent. “It was the worst pain of my life,” she said, reflecting on the race. “I’ve never felt pain like it. I didn’t sit down because I didn’t want to celebrate, I just couldn’t. A little wave was all I had left.” After pushing her body through 10 hurdles, she feared she wouldn’t even make it over the final one. “Please just get over it clean and give everything I have till the finish line,” she recalled thinking.

Fast forward to 2024, and in a candid moment on the Hunger & Jeremy podcast, Sydney McLaughlin-Levrone alongside her husband Andre Levrone Jr opened up about how that moment in Oregon affected her mentality moving forward toward the Paris Olympics. Reflecting on the race, she admitted that the pain she experienced left her fearful of pushing herself back to that mental and physical limit. “Ever since Oregon 2022, I’ve been afraid of feeling that kind of pain again,” she confessed. “I felt like I had almost been cheating myself because I was so scared of taking myself mentally back to that place.“

But by 2024, Sydney had a breakthrough in her thinking. “The Lord has given you a gift, and it’s not always going to be easy to do the things He’s placed inside of you,” she explained. “Sometimes it’s going to take discomfort.” This realization allowed her to overcome the fear that had been holding her back and face the challenges ahead. Rather than running from the pain, she learned to embrace it and use it to propel herself forward. But let’s not forget: McLaughlin-Levrone’s path to this point wasn’t a straight line, especially in her first Olympics.

Sydney McLaughlin-Levrone’s hidden struggles during the games

When Sydney McLaughlin-Levrone was 17, the Rio Olympics hit her like a ton of bricks. She came into the Games with big expectations, but things didn’t exactly go according to plan. In the 400m hurdles qualifying heat, she finished fifth. That was just enough to make it to the semifinal, but Sydney wasn’t happy with the result—she was already mentally preparing herself for disappointment. In the semifinal, it didn’t get any better. Another fifth-place finish, and just like that, she was heading home from Rio with nothing to show for all her hard work.

But what no one knew at the time was that Sydney was dealing with something far beyond the pressure of competition. She was seriously sick during the Games—she caught the flu. And it hit her hard. The sickness started on the flight to Rio, where she was stuck in the middle seat at the back of the plane, wedged between strangers who were coughing and sneezing the entire way. She reached Rio exhaustively weak and unable to eat anything while remaining completely drained.

But she didn’t want her parents to worry, so she kept to herself. “I didn’t give them specifics because I didn’t want them to worry,” she said. The tough period in Sydney’s life ultimately developed her into the champion that she truly became.