British sprinter Louie Hinchliffe bursts into the spotlight with sizzling 9.84

The 21-year-old’s 100m time in Arkansas was slightly wind-assisted but the Carl Lewis-coached athlete showed brilliant speed

Louie Hinchliffe came into this season with a 100m best of 10.11 from last year, when he ranked No.11 in the UK. Yet on Friday (May 24) in Arkansas the 21-year-old from Sheffield scorched to an eye-catching 9.84 (+2.5).

Racing for the University of Houston – where the coach is nine-time Olympic champion Carl Lewis – Hinchliffe’s time was slightly wind-assisted. Still, the only British athlete to have run faster is Zharnel Hughes with his national record of 9.83 (1.3) from New York last year.

Hinchliffe’s brilliant run is also the quickest 100m in the world in all conditions during 2024 so far. Earlier he had run a legal 10.00 (+0.8) in his heat, too.

Only five years ago Hinchliffe was bringing up the rear in last place in the English Schools 100m final. But now he has put himself in the frame for Olympic selection.

A relatively unknown sprinter prior to this summer, despite winning the England Athletics 100m title in 2022, he will one of the most talked about athletes in the run-up to the UK Championships in Manchester in late June. A member of Sheffield and Dearne AC in the UK, where he was coached by Rudolph Paul Hohn, he was a talented golfer before focusing on athletics.

At just 5ft 9in tall he got into his stride quickly in Arkansas on Friday before producing a final surge over the closing stages that his mentor, Lewis, would have been proud of.

In addition to his 100m individual performance at this NCAA West preliminary round meeting, Hinchliffe, who previously studied at Lancaster University and Washington State, teamed up with Houston Cougars team-mates Ireon Brown, Cayden Broadnax and Shaun Maswanganyi to clock 38.80 as they qualified for the NCAA Championships in Eugene on June 5-8 in the sprint relay.

Louie Hinchliffe (Houston Athletics)

The results are a great success for Houston where Lewis is head sprints coach. Now aged 62, he won nine Olympic titles and eight world gold medals. These include Olympic 100m, 200m, long jump and 4x100m titles, which he won 40 years ago this summer at the Los Angeles Games in 1984.