Allyson Felix just made a decision when it comes to her track and field career. The 36-year-old Olympic legend went to Instagram this week to announce that she will be retiring after the 2022 season. Felix told her fans she’s given everything she has and revealed that she is “running for you” this year.
“As a little girl they called chicken legs, never in my wildest dreams would I have imagined I’d have a career like this,” Felix wrote in the Instagram 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.
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“This season isn’t about the time on the clock, it’s simply about joy. If you see me on the track this year I hope to share a moment, a memory and my appreciation with you. This season I’m running for women. I’m running for a better future for my daughter. I’m running for you. More to come on that, so stay tuned, but I’ll be sharing a series of announcements that I’m hoping will make the world better for women.”
Felix is the most decorated woman in Olympic track history and the most decorated American track and field athlete in Olympic history as she has won seven 11 medals from 2004 to 2020. She has won seven gold medals, three silver medals and one bronze medal which came in the 2020 Tokyo Olympics last year. Felix has also won 18 medals in the World Championships and 13 of those medals are gold. She competes in the 200 meters and the 4×100 meter relay.
“I think any other Olympics, a bronze medal would be almost disappointing to me,” Felix told PopCulture.com in an exclusive interview in November, “but having overcome everything that I did and being an older athlete and just kind of the combination of all those things that I was fighting against, it just made it… I think I was more joyful for that medal than so many of the other ones. So yeah, I definitely had a different approach and really a different motivation this time around.”
