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Allyson Felix, who finished last year’s Tokyo Games with more Olympic medals than any US track and field athlete in history, has announced her intention to retire after the 2022 season concludes.
‘This season isn’t about the time on the clock, it’s simply about joy,’ Felix said in an Instagram post Wednesday. ‘If you see me on the track this year I hope to share a moment, a memory and my appreciation with you.’
At age 35, Felix won a bronze medal in the 400 meters last summer in Tokyo, then followed it up with a gold medal in the 4×400 relay.
‘As a little girl they called chicken legs, never in my wildest dreams would I have imagined I’d have a career like this,’ read Felix’s post. ‘I have so much gratitude for this sport that has changed my life. I have given everything I have to running and for the first time I’m not sure if I have anything left to give. I want to say goodbye and thank you to the sport and people who have helped shape me the only way I know how—with one last run.’

Allyson Felix, who finished last year’s Tokyo Games with more Olympic medals than any US track athlete in history, has announced her intention to retire after the 2022 season concludes

Allyson Felix kisses her husband Kenneth Ferguson while holding her daughter Camryn after day nine of the 2020 US Olympic Trials at Hayward Field last year in Eugene, Oregon

At age 35, Felix won a bronze medal in the 400 meters last summer in Tokyo, then followed it up with a gold medal in the 4×400 relay. ‘As a little girl they called chicken legs, never in my wildest dreams would I have imagined I’d have a career like this,’ read Felix’s post. ‘I have so much gratitude for this sport that has changed my life. I have given everything I have to running and for the first time I’m not sure if I have anything left to give. I want to say goodbye and thank you to the sport and people who have helped shape me the only way I know how—with one last run’
Those were her 10th and 11th Olympic medals, which helped her pass Carl Lewis in the US record book and left her behind only one runner in history, Finland’s Paavo Nurmi, who won 12 medals between 1920 and 1928.
Her last major meets figure to be the US championships from June 23-26, then the world championships, which take place in Eugene, Oregon, from July 15-24.
Felix also has a record 13 gold medals and 18 overall from world championships.
In her Instagram post, she said: ‘This season I’m running for women. I’m running for a better future for my daughter.’
Now she’s become an outspoken advocate for women, in part, as a result of a difficult pregnancy.
Camryn, her daughter with her sprinter husband, Kenneth Ferguson, was born in 2018. Felix has spoken candidly about the struggle to come back from the difficult pregnancy that led to an emergency C-section and put the lives of both her and her baby in jeopardy. Camryn actually spent time in the neonatal intensive-care unit after she was born.

Bronze medal winner Allyson Felix of Team United States interacts with teammate Quanera Hayes after competing in the Women’s 400m Final on day fourteen of the Tokyo 2020 Olympic Games at Olympic Stadium on August 6, 2021

US athlete Allyson Felix runs during the women’s 4x400m relay final at the National stadium as part of the 2008 Beijing Olympic Games on August 23, 2008. The United States won the Olympic women’s 4×400-meter relay title in a time of 3mins 18.54secs

Felix celebrates with her husband Kenneth Ferguson and their daughter Camryn after finishing second in the Women’s 400 Meters Final at the 2020 U.S. Olympic Track & Field Team Trials

A view of the Saysh shoes worn by Allyson Felix of Team United States as she competes in the Women’s 400m Semi-Final on day twelve of the Tokyo 2020 Olympic Games

Allyson Felix of Team USA reacts after winning the bronze medal in the Women’s 400m Final on day fourteen of the Tokyo 2020 Olympic Games at Olympic Stadium on August 6, 2021
Around the same time, Felix cut ties with Nike, upset with the way the company treated pregnant athletes.
‘I asked Nike to contractually guarantee that I wouldn’t be punished if I didn’t perform at my best in the months surrounding childbirth,’ Felix wrote in a New York Times op-ed in May of 2019. ‘I wanted to set a new standard. If I, one of Nike’s most widely marketed athletes, couldn’t secure these protections, who could?

Camryn, Allyson, and Kenneth Ferguson
‘Nike declined. We’ve been at a standstill ever since.’
Felix has since launched her own athletic shoe brand, Saysh, which she wore on the medal podium in Tokyo.
‘My first year back was a struggle, and I just kept getting hit with thing after thing,’ Felix told the Associated Press before the Tokyo Games began. ‘There was the sponsorship battle [with Nike], and I was just ‘Man, I hope something comes together for me.’ I just kept fighting. I wanted to give it one more shot.’
She’s spoken of the pressure she felt to return quickly, even when her body wasn’t responding the way it once did.
Felix also overcame one of her biggest hurdles – leaving her well-cultivated private image behind to become a spokesperson for something much bigger.
‘When I line up for a race, I’m normally afraid,’ she said in a heartfelt essay on social media, posted only hours before winning bronze in Tokyo. ‘I’m not afraid of losing. I lose much more than I win. That’s life and I think that’s how it’s supposed to be.’
Source: Daily Mail