Fred Kerley

He claimed the 400 m at the NCAA Division I Championships in March 2017 in a world-leading time of 44.85 seconds, one of the top ten fastest indoor times ever. He anchored the Aggies to a come-from-behind victory in the 4 X 400 m relay alongside his younger brother Mylik Kerley. Texas A&M’s first-ever team triumph at the NCAA Track and Field Championships, held on their home track, was made possible by the 20 points earned by the team from the two first-place results.

Kerley won the 400 m at the USATF Championships in June 2017 in 44.03 seconds, earning the right to compete for the United States in both the 400 m and the 4 x 400 m relay at the World Championships in Athletics. He placed third in his semi-final after winning his heat and marched into the finals. He placed seventh in the final in a timing of 45.23 seconds, unable to maintain his previous season form. He returned the following day to assist the USA in advancing to the relay finals, and guided the US team to a silver medal victory just behind Trinidad & Tobago.

After turning professional in 2017, Kerley enrolled in club ALTIS in Phoenix, Arizona, and trained there under the direction of Kevin Tyler for the 2018 campaign. He went back to Texas A&M in 2019 to work out with Alleyne Francique, his old trainer. Kerley marked his 2021 outdoor debut on March 20 at the Tropical Park Elite Sprints Meet at Tropical Park, Florida, with a couple of fastest times in the 100 m, 10.15 s in the heats and 10.11 s in the finals. On April 4, he bettered on his mark twice more at the Pure Athletics Spring Invitational in Clermont, Florida, with heat times of 10.06 and a final time of 10.03.

Kerley broke the 10-second barrier in the 100 meters at the TRUfit Classic in Miami on April 24, 2021, winning in 9.91 seconds with a maximum permissible wind velocity (+2.0 m/s). On May 19, he defeated Justin Gatlin, a previous Olympic and World champion, to win the men’s 100-meter race at the Golden Spike in Ostrava in 9.96 seconds.  On June 27, 2021, Kerley ran a 19.90 to register his first 200-meter time under 20 seconds in the 200-meter final of the US Olympic Trials. Fred Kerley joined the “Sub 10s, 20s, 44s club for the 100m, 200m, and 400m sprints” with this effort, becoming him the third athlete (after Wayde van Niekerk & Michael Norman) to achieve this feat.

His present biggest rival is compatriot Michael Norman. In 2022, Norman became the world champion in both the 400 meters and 4×400 meter relay events. He also holds the world best time in the indoor 400 meters competition.

Kerley is the son of Ricky and Virginia Kerley, whom he once called as absent parents. He said in a tweet that when his aunt Virginia adopted him, his mother was missing and his father was in jail. Kerley was born into a family of two brothers and two sisters, all of whom were adopted by his aunt at an early age. There were 13 kids living in the same house, including his aunt’s own children. But she looked after each of them.