Gabby Thomas, one of the deepest thinkers in track, chose to view herself as “healing” instead of “injured” last year.
That, in short, is how the Olympic gold medalist — slowed, then eventually stopped by an aching Achilles tendon — made it through a frustrating 2025 and turned it into a much more interesting and successful 2026.
“You are setting up to come back even better,” Thomas said of the change in mindset about being hurt. “And every time that I’ve had an injury, I’ve always come back stronger and better and faster. So that was what I was thinking, and then, just staying focused.”
The 29-year-old Thomas, who won the 200 meters at the Paris Games two years ago and is ramping up for a repeat attempt two years from now in Los Angeles, is not competing at this weekend’s U.S. track championships in New York. She said it is not a signal that she is hurting.
In one of the interesting twists of 2026 — the middle year of the Olympic cycle that’s always a little quirky for track — nationals did not fit into her Diamond League and international schedule. She’s doing just fine there, with five sub-22 second runs this season, which gives her 20 for her career — the most by any woman at the distance.
She traveled to New York to cheer on some of her teammates sponsored by Toyota, which arranged this interview.
Among the highlights coming up for Thomas will be the World Athletics Ultimate Championships, where $150,000 first prizes are available, and more races at Athlos, the all-women league founded by Alexis Ohanian that is heading into its third year with a growing roster of runners, including Friday night’s 100-meter champion, Sha’Carri Richardson.
Athlos’ second meet of the year will be in October at Ichan Stadium on New York’s Randall’s Island, the same place where nationals are this weekend.
Thomas also is planning a wedding. Last spring, she got engaged to onetime Yale quarterback Spencer McManes (Thomas went to Harvard) and they’ll get married in October at a location she did not divulge. Planning a wedding in the middle of track season?
“It’s not challenging,” she said. “I always say, you make time for what you care about and what you want to do, so if you love it, you’ll do it.”
She takes that mindset into her off-the-track life, where she still has plans for a career in women’s health once the running stops. Thomas studied neurobiology and public health as an undergrad, then got a master’s degree in public health at the University of Texas Health Science Center in Houston.
“As a female athlete and really understanding the gaps in women’s healthcare and how underfunded and how undersuited it is, there’s a lot of room for improvement,” Thomas said. “I see myself being a part of that and narrowing that gap quite naturally. I think I will have to go back to school. I would definitely welcome that.”
Through much of 2025, Thomas was vocal about combating a growing trend of online harassment of female athletes by bettors. Earlier this week, she went on social media and doubled down on that, saying only one demographic of people harass her, “and it’s never women.”
Off the track, Thomas is reading a few books by Bell Hooks, a philosopher and author who wrote extensively about race and feminism, that have reminded one of the world’s greatest sprinters that there’s more to life than track. In a way, it might help explain how Thomas — healthy again — can be sitting out of nationals but still loving every minute of it.
“It’s so easy to get very, very involved and tied into track and to make that your identity, especially at my level,” she said. “It’s been a nice reminder to think about who I am off the track, what I love, who I want to be.”
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