Olympic and world champions Sydney McLaughlin-Levrone and Athing Mu will miss next week’s Los Angeles Grand Prix, a two-day extravaganza at Drake Stadium billed as the most talent-loaded track meet in Southern California since the 1984 Olympic Games.
Bob Kersee, who coaches McLaughlin-Levrone and Mu in Los Angeles, described the pair’s reasons for missing the meet as “nothing serious.”
McLaughlin-Levrone, who lowered the 400-meter hurdles world record to 50.68 seconds in winning the World Championships last summer, was scheduled to race Olympic silver medalist Marileidy Paulino in the flat 400. McLaughlin-Levrone is considered the first real threat to Marita Koch of East Germany’s nearly 38-year-old world 400 record of 47.60.
Mu, the Olympic and world 800-meter champion, relocated to Los Angeles from Texas last fall to train with Kersee, whose athletes have won nearly 70 Olympic and World Championships gold medals.
UPDATE: Setbacks won’t keep McLaughline-Levrone and Athing Mu from chasing world records
Even without Mu and McLaughlin-Levrone, the meet is still loaded with Olympic and World champions, including the reigning Olympic and world pole vault champions Mondo Duplantis and Katie Moon; shot putter Ryan Crouser, the two-time Olympic champion who owns eight of the top 12 throws in history; Chase Ealey, the first American woman to win a world title in the shot put; and Tobi Amusan and Keni Harrison, the two fastest women in history over the 100-meter hurdles.
The meet opens with the women’s pole vault, the hammer throw and middle and long distance events Friday, May 26, with the meet resuming on the afternoon of Saturday, May 27.
