Sha’Carri Richardson Divulges Her Measured Mentality Ahead of Paris Games

The track and field star will be making her Olympic debut this year.

Sha’Carri Richardson / Tim Clayton/Getty Images

The 2024 Olympic Games are just around the corner, and Sha’Carri Richardson is ready.

In the year leading up to the Games, according to a recent interview with Vogue, the star track and field athlete has had a certain phrase on repeat: “I’m not back, I’m better.”

She was referring, of course, to her inability to compete in the 2021 Tokyo Games. She was gearing up for an impressive showing when her hopes were dashed by her suspension after she tested positive for marijuana. But she doesn’t appear to be wrestling with that. She has her eyes set on what’s to come—on being better.

This track season has served as preparation for the big stage: the Olympic Games. “It’s like chess,” Richardson said of competing this season. “Every move you make is leading to checkmate. So the Olympics, okay, that’s checkmate, that’s the moment an athlete dreams about. But every race I have leading up to that matters too—that’s my opportunity to grow, so by the time I’m on the track in Paris, I know I’ve done my trial and error.”

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From the start of the track season this spring, the athlete has been locked in every time she set foot on the track. “Because if all I’m doing is looking ahead,” Richardson said of her mentality, “then I can’t be where I need to be. Which is here, now.”

Come the end of July, the 24-year-old will take to Paris for her first Olympic Games, where she is set to compete in the 100-meter dash.