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Noah Lyles has reclaimed his rightful place atop the sprinting world.
A year after the U.S. superstar couldn't quite nab gold at the Olympics, he ascended to the top of the podium at the World Championships in Tokyo in the men's 200-meter final.
The victory made the Olympics look more and more like an outlier. Lyles has won the last four World Championships in the 200.
With that four in a row, Lyles has matched Jamaican superhero Usain Bolt in history. Bolt and Lyles are the only two men to ever four-peat in the Worlds 200 meters.
Bolt, of course, remains the world-record holder at an obscene 19.19 seconds, which he ran in 2009 to start his streak of four.
Lyles came across the line in 19.52 seconds on Friday, plenty fast to get the job done.
He held off "Kung Fu" Kenny Bednarek, who ran a 19.58 for silver after the pair had a bit of a shoving match at the U.S. national championships after qualifying for Tokyo.
The Olympic gold medalist Letsile Tebogo didn't even get on the podium. Jamaica's Bryan Levell ran 19.64 for bronze.
It's a statement that Lyles surely was happy to make. You can see it in the photo at the top of this article. This is a confident, defiant superstar who never ever believes that anyone on the track is better than him.
And while there will be more global championship racing before the 2028 Los Angeles Olympics, the countdown is on.
Lyles would like nothing better than to triumph on home soil in the event in which he is the second-best ever at. He'll have just turned 31 when those Olympics roll around. He'll have to take good care of himself to have a chance against a field that is always welcoming in young speedsters.
But no one would bet against Lyles, whose career best of 19.31 is faster than the legendary Michael Johnson ever ran.
Lyles will be there in L.A. And even three years out, it's hard to imagine him letting anyone else beat him.
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