Noah Lyles has spent 2025 battling to hold ground against a new force in men’s sprinting, and the duel is quickly becoming the defining story of the season. Kishane Thompson, the 23-year-old Jamaican whose 9.75 seconds at his national trials still stands as the fastest mark in the world this year, has not only challenged Lyles’s supremacy but has already beaten him head-to-head. Their meeting in Silesia on August 16 confirmed what the numbers had suggested: the rivalry is real, and it is tightening. Lyles clocked a season’s best of 9.90, but it was Thompson who crossed first in 9.87, equaling the meet record and forcing the reigning world champion to rethink his route to Tokyo.

The paths that brought them here have been markedly different. Thompson entered 2025 eager to make up for time l

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