​Ja’Kobe Tharp, who just turned 18, was the youngest high hurdler at the 2024 Olympic Trials and entered the meet with no delusions about making the Paris squad. He even skipped the trials semifinals to rest a stubborn hamstring and focus on the World U20 Championships. A chat at the trials with his idol, Grant Holloway—eventual Olympic gold medalist—proved prophetic. “You’re next up,” Holloway told him, i.e., he would be one of the greatest hurdlers if he stayed the course. A year later, Tharp captured the U.S. title in Holloway’s absence on the same Hayward Field track. Then, at last month’s NCAA Championships, also at Hayward, Tharp exceeded even his own expectations, shaving his personal best from 13.01 seconds to 12.75 and breaking Aries Merritt’s 2012 world record of 12.80. Tharp now owns an individual world record in an Olympic running event, joining his bowling best of 217 as part of his mark. He turned pro this week ahead of racing at Saturday’s Prefontaine Classic, again at Hayward.
“How to watch the 2026 Prefontaine Classic: TV, live stream info, broadcast schedule, preview” — Don’t miss the 2026 Prefontaine Classic this Friday and Saturday on NBC and Peacock. Auburn coach Ken Harnden, a 1996 and 2000 Olympic hurdler for Zimbabwe, mused that the world record has sharpened Tharp’s edge. “He understands the target is on his back, but Ja’Kobe is a pressure guy. He thrives on it.”
Tharp, a Vinland Saga devotee from Murfreesboro, Tennessee, didn’t make Rockvale Middle School’s basketball team in seventh grade, so he turned to track, where long legs drawn him to the 100m or 200m. Coach Haneef Sharif urged him to try the hurdles, knowing—having won the 1998 and 2000 Ohio Valley Conference titles in the 110m hurdles for Middle Tennessee State—that hurdles could suit him. Tharp approached the 39-inch barriers with some reluctance. “I think very few people choose the hurdles,” he recalled. “Nobody wants to fall in front of a crowd.” In eight years of hurdling, he hasn’t fallen once.
He captured his first Tennessee state title in eighth grade. After COVID-19 wiped out his high school freshman season, he was seeded sixth at state as a sophomore and finished third. “We had to go find his medal in the trash,” Sharif joked. Tharp rededicated himself, obsessing over technique and becoming the best hurdler he could be, with Sharif predicting he would become “the best hurdler to ever do it.” He won the state title as a high school junior and marked the victory with his first tattoo on the back of his right arm—a man ascending stairs with the words “stay hungry.” At 15, he already declared he’d be the fastest hurdler in the world.