Saint Lucia’s Julien Alfred stunned the world earlier this month when she hurled past the USA’s Sha’Carri Richardson to win gold in the women’s 100-meter dash at the Paris Olympics. With that, the 23-year-old sprinter also made track connoisseurs believe that the 33rd Olympics could be the stage of her meteoric rise to fame. However, in the 200-meter final, Alfred fell short of delivering a similar kind of performance. But track fans aren’t quite convinced that all of it’s on Julien.

Gabby Thomas breezed across the finishing line to clinch gold in the event at the French capital, and Alfred had to settle for silver. While the Texas Longhorns star failed to bag a double gold at the quadrennial tournament, the track community believes things could have been entirely different under better circumstances.

A post by Track Spice on X from August 22 brings fans’ attention to how Alfred had to face insurmountable challenges before her 200m heats. “Six races in five days take it out of you,” the post quotes Julien, underscoring how exhaustion was as big a foe she had to fight along with the likes of Thomas. “With just two hours of sleep before her 200-meter heat, Alfred’s body was pushed to its breaking point,” The Track Spice post shares the alarming conditions in which Alfred had to keep running.

On August 4, Alfred had to compete in the 200m heats just hours after winning the 100-meter gold in the Paris Olympics. Naturally, many would speculate she couldn’t bring out her A-game in the longer distance after having to go all out in the previous race. “ She fought through fatigue, clocking in at 22.41 seconds to win her heat, but the toll was evident,” says the post.

“Could the outcome have been different with better conditions?” Track Spice ponders, and debates ensued as community members jumped in to chime in on the matter with their takes on the matter.

Paris Olympics star Julien Alfred finds vehement support from the community

For obvious reasons, the sprinter’s fans are fuming over the “chaotic organization of the Paris Games.” That being said, Julien’s loyalists aren’t also ready to accept the fact that the Olympian didn’t have eyes on the prize which cost her the gold in the 200m final. Drawing attention to how Noah Lyles or Letsile Tebogo weren’t subjected to a similar kind of flak from track fans in the comment section of the original post, Krissy grunted, “Please leave Julien alone.”

One fan-run page has a rather radical solution to the issue: cut loose the people who jumbled up the schedule that required athletes to push themselves to the edge at the grandest sports event of the year. “Seriously the officials who set the timings need to get fired forever I mean forever,” posits the comment, and some fans wouldn’t be too reluctant to support the suggestion!

Doug also thinks a longer break time between races should be warranted considering the stakes that the sprinters have to keep in mind. “they should stop having 100m finals 2 hours after the semis,” said this fan earnestly.

However, Anthony, on the other hand, thinks this is the exact kind of benchmark that athletes have to comply with if they wish to become elite stars in their respective sports. Doing a double is incredibly difficult and very few runners have ever accomplished the feat, with Elaine Thompson-Herah being among the coveted names who have the boasting rights to such a feat. “Just shows how rare and special doing a double is,” reads Anthony’s comment, referring to why sprinting is easily one of the most grueling sports in the world.

The women’s 200m was one of the biggest highlights of the Paris Olympics. With the likes of Jamaican icons like Thompson-Herah and 200m specialist Shericka Jackson both out of the 2024 Games, the gold in the event was up for grabs and Thomas made the most of the opportunity.

With that in mind, some fans also believe that Julien wouldn’t be the one to trounce Gabby in the race. “I love Julien but Gabby was not losing that race,” surmises Casey in the comments of the original X post. Do you also think the Paris Olympics results would have changed if Alfred got the chance to recover for longer before the 200m final? Tell us in the comments!