Following his recent 50m race challenge against Olympic and world champion Noah Lyles, American YouTuber and streamer IShowSpeed (Darren Jason Watkins Jr.) announced that his newest pursuit will be to compete at the L.A. Olympics in 2028. Alongside his energetic gaming videos, the content creator has shown off his natural athleticism through soccer matches, backflips, sprinting challenges and jumping over moving cars–so fans think that Speed has a shot.
🚨| BREAKING: Speed has announced he will be RUNNING in the 100m at the 2028 OLYMPICS 🤯 pic.twitter.com/NHj49WAy9Q
— Speedy HQ (@IShowSpeedHQ) November 17, 2024
“In 2028, I’ll be running at the Olympics for sure,” Speed said at a live event on Sunday. He revealed he would race the 50m, 100m and “maybe” 200m races–before it was pointed out that there isn’t a 50m race at the Games. Fans speculate that with training, the 19-year-old could have potential to do well in the sport. “Speed, with some training, actually has a big chance to win,” one commenter said.
In the match-up against Lyles in early November, Speed delivered a surprisingly quick start. The YouTuber was winning for the first few steps before Lyles caught up and comfortably claimed the win. Although YouTube fans say it was a close race and Speed himself even insisted it was a tie, track fans know otherwise.
“Now, everybody is scared to race me,” Speed said during a stream on Nov. 11. “I’m not about to say no names, but all these people who are professionals–whatever they’re professionals at–they are scared to race me.”
“That even goes out to Noah,” he added. “That’s the reason Noah didn’t even want to race me again. If Noah would have raced me again, he knows he would have lost.”
Making the U.S. Olympic team would require a significant shift in focus and dedicated training; the 19-year-old was a sprinter in high school but now is a full-time content creator. Speed has 35 million TikTok followers, 26 million Instagram followers and 33 million subscribers on his YouTube channel.
@nfl definitely official 😂 #ishowspeed #sketch #nfl @IShowSpeed @Sketch ♬ original sound – NFL
In April, he turned heads after claiming to run the 40-yard dash (36.5 metres) in 4.4 seconds–while wearing foam shoes. The 40-yard dash is a benchmark speed test for NFL athletes, and even for professionals, a time under 4.6 seconds is considered exceptionally fast.
