For Gabby Thomas, 2025 was supposed to mark her next big step. But an Achilles injury sustained in May steadily worsened, forcing the sprinter to withdraw from the 2025 World Championships. It forced Thomas into an eight-month layoff, and during that time, she recovered and shifted her focus, attempting to use 2026 to test new disciplines. That made her latest call ahead of the World Athletics Ultimate Championships all the more unexpected.

That’s because Thomas announced, in January of this year, that her focus for the 2026 season will be the 400m as she’s looking to experiment and have fun with things. Yet having qualified for the World Athletics Ultimate Championship after winning the 200m gold medal at the Paris Olympics, the 29-year-old will race in that discipline in Budapest.

“With no Olympics or worlds this year, it is a great opportunity for athletes to have fun,” Thomas told AW. “I’ve explored a few different things in training and kind of pushed it a little bit more on the endurance side [Thomas has publicised mile reps on social media]. Training for three events [100m/200m/400m] has its own challenges because they all require such different skills.

“I want to throw some more 400m races in the schedule this year.  I really do think that I have a lot of potential in the 400m, but that being said, the 200m is always going to be my favourite event. It’s my baby and that’s the one I’ll run in Budapest.”

However, as she attested, Gabby Thomas does plan to run the 400m throughout the year, with the World Athletics Ultimate Championship as one of the only events where she will focus on the 200m. That doesn’t mean the 400m is new to her, but her commitment to the change became evident last year. Before 2025, Thomas had only run the 400m a handful of times, not running in the discipline at all in 2022.

Since then, however, Thomas has slowly added to her repertoire, clocking a personal best of 49.14 seconds at the 2025 Grand Slam Track meet in Kingston, Jamaica. She came in second, marking her best-ever result in the discipline and her best time since 2023 (49.68). It was the fruits of her labours, as the Olympic gold medalist had constantly posted about her preparation across social media.

But then the injury struck, and Thomas was supposed to make her return to the track in early 2026, but that got delayed as her comeback will now kick off at the Texas Relays from April 1-4.

Gabby Thomas reflects on her Achilles injury and how it changed her mindset

However, it’s not the first time that Gabby Thomas has been forced to overcome a bad injury that has sidelined her. The 29-year-old suffered something similar in 2022, when, just before the USATF Outdoor Championships, Thomas suffered a hamstring strain. Yet despite the injury, the sprinter participated and finished eighth in the event, missing out on qualifying for the home worlds.

But Gabby Thomas used that as inspiration, and it propelled her into a 200m silver medal at the worlds the next year before going on to win the Olympic gold in Paris and more. Yet her Achilles injury this time around forced the 29-year-old to think about the future of her career.

“Yeah,” Thomas told SI. “Longevity is something I’ve thought about a lot, and I probably started thinking about it after my first injury in 2022. Coming back from that, and then having the best seasons of my career in 2023 and 2024, I proved to myself that bouncing back from injuries is very possible, and that you can come back even stronger. In fact, it’s likely you’ll come back even stronger.

“I’ve realized it’s part of the ups and downs of sports. You hear people say you can’t get too high and you can’t get too low, and that’s kind of embedded in that.”

Already 29, Thomas is approaching the twilight of her career, as history says that most sprinters tend to lose their explosiveness and fitness post 30. But the American Olympian has high hopes for her future, as she aims to emulate Shelly-Ann Fraser-Pryce, who retired in 2025 at 38.

“When I think about longevity, I look at athletes like Allyson Felix and Shelly-Ann [Fraser-Pryce], who had incredibly long careers,” Thomas added. “That depends on how you tackle your career while you’re in it. For me, it’s about taking care of myself, and things like sleep, nutrition, and training appropriately all tie into that.

“I want a long, healthy career where I’m enjoying the sport, having fun, and of course, winning medals. That’s my guiding star.”

Whether that balance between experimentation and familiarity pays off will become clearer once Thomas returns to competition. For now, her decision keeps one eye on the future while ensuring she remains a contender on the sport’s biggest stage.