PARIS — When she isn’t dominating the 400-meter hurdles in a way unlike any woman in history before her, the American Sydney McLaughlin-Levrone writes poetry. It’s an apt hobby for the woman who continues to rewrite her sport’s record book.

McLaughlin-Levrone, 25, wrote a stunning new chapter to her already decorated career Thursday by winning the Paris Olympic final in a world record of 50.37 seconds. She easily beat her top rival, Femke Bol of the Netherlands, to turn what had been expected to be a duel into a runaway victory.

American Anna Cockrell won silver in 51.87, while Bol faded to third in 52.15. She appeared to be holding back tears after the finish, shaking her head, while McLaughlin-Levrone posed with an American flag.

It is her third career Olympic gold medal, following titles in Tokyo in the hurdles and the 4×400-meter relay. On Thursday, she said she would like to run the relay in Paris, as well.

Running even with Bol on the final turn with 150 meters to go, McLaughlin-Levrone pulled away entering her favorite point of the race — between the seventh and eighth hurdles of the 10-hurdle competition, which comes right as she comes off the final turn, into the last straightaway. The difference was dramatic: McLaughlin-Levrone ran her final three hurdles to the finish line in 15.13 seconds, which was 1.3 seconds faster than Bol, who is typically one of the sport’s top closers.

By now, the wide gap between her and everyone else has become so routine that 30 minutes after she crossed, McLaughlin-Levrone nitpicked her latest world record, barely breathing. 

“Was hoping it was a little faster, but like I said, I’m sure there are some things in the middle we can clean up,” she said.

When McLaughlin-Levrone established her first world record in June 2021, she ran 51.90 seconds. Within 13 months, she had lowered it to 51.46, then 51.41, then 50.68 to win the 2022 world championship, which Seb Coe, the president of track and field’s global governing body, described as “jaw-dropping.” No woman had ever before broken the 51-second barrier.

After she raced the open 400 meters last year and ended the year with a knee injury, she returned to the hurdles this spring to prepare for Paris and lowered her world record again, to 50.65, at the U.S. Olympic trials, a time so jaw-dropping, again, that it would have finished sixth at the championships’ open 400 — the race that doesn’t include 10 hurdles. 

“This [world record] felt similar to trials, just in terms of effort,” she said. “I think the one from two years ago hurt a lot more. Breaking that threshold is always the hardest part. Now it’s kind of just fine-tuning.”

Yet last month, McLaughlin-Levrone had company. Bol became the second to dip under 51 seconds when she ran 50.95. 

Exception for pole vaulter Mondo Duplantis, who set the world record for the ninth time en route to winning gold, no other track and field athletes had distanced themselves from their competition to the degree that McLaughlin-Levrone and Bol, 24; have.

McLaughlin-Levrone held a 2-0 lifetime record against Bol, but they hadn’t raced against each other in two years. That scarcity, combined with the fast times each had produced racing others, built the anticipation for Thursday’s showdown in Stade de France. Ultimately, the final reasserted McLaughlin-Levrone’s control over the event by improving her winning streak to 25 consecutive races, which began in August 2019.