EUGENE: Noah Lyles stormed past rising rival Erriyon Knighton to win the US 200m title on Sunday and warned the world to expect more of the same when Eugene hosts the World Championships in July.
“They already know – coming to Oregon and we’re coming to win,” Lyles said.
And that doesn’t go just for Lyles himself as he brashly predicted the United States would break the men’s 4 x 100m relay world record at Hayward Field, the beloved US athletics venue that will host the first World Championships ever held in the United States.
“We are definitely winning the relay,” Lyles said. “We’re going to break the world record. I can see it, I can already see it in my head right now.”
Lyles needed a storming finish to see off 18-year-old Knighton on Sunday.
The youngster, who ran an electrifying 19.49sec at a meeting in Louisiana in May, came off the curve with a sizeable lead only for Lyles to run him down.
“I’m definitely confident in my top-end speed and my ability to hold it,” Lyles said. “Coming off that turn I definitely had a thought of ‘Oh, shoot! Maybe he is in 19.4 shape.’
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“And I thought, ‘So what, I can run 19.4.’”
In the end, Lyles won in 19.67 with Knighton second in 19.69 and Fred Kerley third in 19.83.
“I’m OK with the time,” Lyles said. “Running 19.6 again reminds me of 2018 when I was just dropping them back to back. I’m OK with that for now, but it’s definitely going to be getting faster as these weeks progress.”
He was also unconcerned with his running of the curve, saying technically there was no problem.
“I think it’s just going to come from my body recovering from Covid,” said Lyles, who found he had the illness after winning in New York two weeks ago.
“It took a little while to get my muscles to adapt throughout all three rounds. “I felt when we finally got to the finals my body was like OK, primed and ready to go.
“I was able to give the big kicks when I wanted to, and it showed in the last 100.”
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