Noah Lyles has specialized in 100m and 200m but could we see him running a longer distance in the near future? The American sprint king has discussed that possibility.
World and Olympics champion Noah Lyles agrees that he will take up a longer distance in future, other than the 100m and 200m for which he is known for.
Lyles is the world and Olympics 100m champion, having won the titles in 2023 and 2024 respectively, while he is also a three-time world 200m champion after his heroics over the distance in 2019, 2022 and 2023.
The American is preparing to defend his titles at the 2025 World Championships in Tokyo, Japan but while it might not happen this year, he is open to running 400m in future.
Lyles hinted at this during a conversation on the Beyond the Records podcast, which he co-hosts with fellow sprinters and Olympics champions Rai Benjamin and Grant Holloway.
Multiple Olympics and world 4x100m champion Vernon Norwood was the guest on the latest episode and he took Lyles to task over whether he would consider running 400m.
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“I want to see you do a 400m one day,” Norwood told Lyles who responded by saying: “It will come. One day.”
Norwood pressed further, telling Lyles to take up the challenge at the 2025 US Championships.
“You want to try something new at the USA’s (USA National Championships)? Because you can do the first round, everybody in the first round will be chilling, so you can go out there and blast the first round, open their minds,” he said.
“It does provide a very nice slot,” Lyles replied, with Norwood telling him to try the distance at major championships.
“Look, because you want to, at some point, at the World Championships or Olympic Games, you want to run the 4x400m, right?”
But the ever-demanding Lyles has conditions for such a shift in his career as he wants to be sure that he can fully compete and win before switching.
“Yeah, and the thing is, I don’t want to half-a*s it. Like when I do commit to the 400m, I don’t want to half-a*s it,” he said.
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Lyles has previously expressed his desire to run 400m, especially in late 2023, when he claimed he was going to win four Olympics medals in 100, 200m, 4x100m relay and 400m at the 2024 Paris Games.
However, he could only manage gold in 100m and bronze in 200m and it is not known if he still harbors those ambitions this year.
Lyles is preparing for the World Indoor Championships, set to take place in Nanjing, China from March 21-23, but he will likely run the 60m dash only as he seeks to improve on his bronze medal from last year’s edition.
