ON YOUR MARK

What makes Sha'Carri Richardson the fastest woman in the world? Untold hours on the track, family love and support, a determination to win and the signature nails help too. Maya Singer meets the Paris-bound Olympic superstar

- Maya Singer

Sha'Carri Richardson is not here. Day in, day out, the 24-year-old sprinter makes her way to central Florida's posh Montverde Academy and joins her training mates on the school's manicured track. Practice runs 10 a.m. to 2 p.m., coach Dennis Mitchell explains, rain or shine. The rest of the runners are present and accounted for this morning, limbering up under a sky of gathering clouds. But Richardson is stuck at the dentist-an emergency entailing novocaine, painkillers, the works. "We'll see if she shows," Mitchell says with a shrug. We'll see? For most people, dental torture is a great excuse to skip a workout. Fire up Netflix, crack open a pint of ice cream. But then, most people aren't Olympic-caliber athletes. Most people aren't tipped for gold at this summer's Paris Games. Most people aren't Sha'Carri Richardson, the fastest woman in the world.

And lo and behold, two hours later, there she is. Shiny gold talons flashing as she laces up her sneakers and sets off on a swift warm-up jog. Track practice, I realize, observing from the bleachers, has something of the atmosphere of a movie set-lots of milling around, gossiping, finding ways to stay lively as you await your turn to perform. "Set 'em up!" Mitchell calls out, and four or five runners take their spots on the blocks to run, and rerun, the same 100, 200, 400 meters. When Richardson arrives, it's a bit like a movie star showing up for her scene. Not diva-like in any way, just there to do the work. And by dint of her presence, raising everyone's game. "Set 'em up!" calls Mitchell, and this time it's Richardson taking launch, a five-foot-one pocket rocket crossing the 100-meter finish line in the interval of a single wide-eyed blink. Ambling back toward the starting line, she presses a hand to her swollen cheek, the briefest acknowledgment that, as is her habit, Sha'Carri Richardson is running through the pain.