Elaine Thompson-Herah to miss Jamaican trials, Paris Olympics

Elaine Thompson-Herah, the two-time reigning Olympic 100m and 200m champion, will miss this week’s Jamaican Olympic trials and the Paris Games due to what she called a small Achilles tendon tear.

Thompson-Herah, 31, sustained the injury at the USATF New York City Grand Prix on June 9.

“It’s a long road but I am willing to start over and keep working and to make full recovery and resume my track career,” was posted on her social media. “I am hurt and devastated to be missing the Olympic this year but at the end of the day it’s sports and my health comes first.”

Thompson-Herah and countryman Usain Bolt are the only sprinters to win multiple Olympic titles each in the 100m and 200m.

Thompson-Herah is the second-fastest woman in history in the 100m. She ran 10.54 seconds at the 2021 Prefontaine Classic less than a month after running an Olympic record 10.61 in Tokyo.

American Florence Griffith-Joyner holds the world record of 10.49 from 1988.

Thompson-Herah is also the third-fastest woman in history in the 200m. She ran a personal-best 21.53 to win the Tokyo Olympic title.

In 2023, Thompson-Herah ran strictly the 100m at the Jamaican Championships and placed fifth. She later ran 10.79 at the Pre Classic to finish 2024 as the world’s fifth-fastest woman for the year.

The Jamaican trials are expected to include 2008 and 2012 Olympic 100m champion Shelly-Ann Fraser-Pryce and two-time reigning world 200m champion Shericka Jackson.