“I did at the Olympics. I do it at world championships. I do it wherever it needed to be done. And if I gotta go down and, you know, beat up on Tyreek (Hill) to prove that I’m the world’s fastest, then it’s gonna be done.” – This was Noah Lyles’ response when the NFL athlete said they can take over the track and field any time. But away from the trash talk and on to the track, who really holds the edge?
Well, when we are talking about speedsters, we have to talk about the chart-toppers. In the NFL, that’s Xavier Worthy. In the 2024 NFL Combine, he set the fastest 40-yard dash time at 4.21 seconds. His latest challenger was Texas Longhorns wide receiver Isaiah Bond. He did say he would break that time in this year’s 2025 NFL Combine. Well, he couldn’t. Xavier is still the undisputed NFL speedster. But can Xavier really take down the sprinters who literally run for a living?
The technicalities that will decide the outcome
When Isaiah Bond couldn’t come close to Xavier’s 4.21 time, the bragging rights were duly picked up by the Kansas City Chiefs wide receiver. A subtle reminder on Twitter on March 2 (which NFL reposted on YouTube with Xavier’s dash from 2024) to everyone who thinks they can challenge him: “There’s fast, then there’s me.”
Sure, we will take that he is fast. But let’s compare it with Naoh Lyles’ personal best. The American won the 2024 Paris Olympics gold in the 100m race with a time of 9.79m.
In the breakage of the sprint, Noah Lyles covered his 40m in 4.76m. Now, in case you are thinking we can compare 4.76 to 4.21 straight away, it’s not that simple. First of all, the basic difference is that 40 meters is 43.745 yards. So, even if we do the basic unitary method, we see Lyles run the 40 yards in 4.352. But it’s still not the equivalent estimation.
For the 2023 World Champion in the 100m race, this 4.352 is for an official Olympics sprint race where he had to react to a starting gun. In an NFL Combine 40-yard dash, there’s no gun. A challenger just goes when he wants across a distance of 40 yards to register the time. But when you have to react to a gun, you will always end up taking a split second more, isn’t it? You will always be a little slower than starting the sprint at your own judgment. In the Olympics, the quickest reaction allowed is 0.1 seconds. Any faster than that, and you are disqualified.
So, when you are counting 4.352, it’s actually 4.252 seconds. 4.66 for 40 m is 4.252 for 40 yards. Tyreek’s fastest time is 4.29, set in 2015. So, theoretically, we can say Noah would come out on top. The race will be an exciting affair, especially when we have a result on the paper. Let’s see what the reality is. But we still haven’t talked about Xavier Worthy’s 4.21. That’s definitely faster, isn’t it? Would Xavier beat Noah Lyles?
Well, in the 9.79-second sprint, Noah Lyles hit the top speed of 27.09 mph. On the other hand, Xavier was only hitting 19mph in the 4.21 dash. When you just simply average the speed, the American sprinter was taking 0.979 seconds per 10 m, while Xavier was averaging 0.115 seconds. That kind of puts Noah ahead again. However, this is all theoretical.
While we have been talking about the fastest man in track and field right now, we still haven’t brought the Lightning Bolt into the discussion.
Even if it’s close with Noah Lyles, a Jamaican has something to say
We have been comparing Noah’s sprint split times to his personal best of 9.79 seconds. But Olympic record holder Usain Bolt’s best time is 9.58, which is also a world record. That’s 0.21 seconds knocked off straight away, and on top of that, take away another 0.1 for reactions, which leaves it 9.48. Now, let us be frank that we really can’t provide you with the split times for Bolt as we did for Lyles. But we have Usain Bolt in an NFL Combine 40-yard dash itself!!
Surprised? Well, it was an unofficial run in an indoor setting where even Usain Bolt was in his sweatpants, T-shirt and sneakers. On the turf, Usain ran as fast as he could for the 40 yards. This was two years after he had retired from track and field. And what was the time? 4.22 seconds. Away from training, 32 years old and still registering 4.22 seconds.
And you know Usain Bolt has himself admitted how his races aren’t perfect. In a Usain Bolt exclusive interview on High Performance released on February 15, the Jamaican confesses how his starts are always slow compared to the others around him. This is also because Usain has a bad knack of watching how other racers are doing instead of completely focusing on his own run.
All these do contribute to him being a tiny fraction slower. And still he won gold in 3 consecutive Olympics. Usain is in a league of his own, despite how many challenges people have thrown at him. And he casually runs a 4.22-second 40-yard dash. Xavier Worthy ran 4.21 at 20.
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