It was not how Matthew Hudson-Smith expected his Olympics to be remembered.
But, he says, shouting “F**k” into a television camera seconds after crossing the line in the 400m final encapsulated his journey from the school football pitches of Wolverhampton in the English West Midlands to the medal podium at Paris 2024.
“It summed up a lifetime of hard work,” says the 29-year-old, who was overtaken by America’s Quincy Hall in the final metres of that race at a packed Stade de France but did win silver — his first Olympic medal. “It wasn’t even anything bad, it was just like, ‘Wow, I’ve got an Olympic medal’.
“When you get to that position you don’t know how you’re going to react so when I got there it was just an honest-to-god reaction of ‘Wow’ — the whole race, the emotions of how close it was, almost achieving your life’s goal, being happy but not satisfied. It was all summed up in that one word.
“I think people took it as me being upset or unhappy, but really I was happy and grateful. But I wasn’t satisfied because I didn’t get the gold. It was just a crazy experience — the race, getting silver and the realisation of all the hard work paying off.”
Hudson-Smith admits that growing up he never imagined himself standing on an Olympic medal podium or even competing in the Games at all.
For much of his childhood, his dreams were to do with the football pitches of England’s professional leagues. For a while, he had reason to believe, thanks to spells in the Wolverhampton Wanderers academy and a later stint with a team affiliated to neighbours Walsall’s centre of excellence.
Back then, Hudson-Smith was a full-back with pace to burn. He spent part of his childhood living with his grandmother in Wolverhampton’s Whitmore Reans district, a short walk from Wolves’ Molineux stadium.
“I wasn’t a huge fan of watching football, I was more a fan of playing it,” says Hudson-Smith, speaking to The Athletic at an event with kit supplier Puma. “But where I lived in Whitmore Reans, we would be around the chip shop on Staveley Road and see Wolves fans walking to the stadium, and you could actually hear there (the crowd during matches) from where my nan lived.
“I lived the normal English childhood of wanting to be a footballer. I played for Warstones Wanderers and went through their system and got picked up by Wolves quite early on. I was in the academy for a couple of years and it didn’t work out, so I went to a team called Pendeford Park. Then I got picked up again by Walsall Development, which was linked to Walsall.
“I had the choice of following the Walsall route or choosing the track and I was always leaning more towards the track.”
It turned out to be a shrewd judgement.
Nobody from Hudson-Smith’s Wolves academy team made it to the first team at Molineux — although goalkeeper Jonathan Flatt played in the Conference Premier, the highest level outside England’s four divisions of the professional game. Flatt is now back at Wolves, coaching their next generation of academy goalkeepers.
Hudson-Smith had already got a feel for athletics by the time Walsall gave him a second shot at football and ultimately the lure of track and field proved strong.
“I remember having inter-school country track meets and winning by 50 metres,” he says. “No one wanted to stand next to me, because you had to race against the person you were standing next to.”
That early athletics career was based around the 100m and 200m, and with a degree of success. However, the one-lap distance was always Hudson-Smith’s forte, even though his coach, Tony Hadley, sent him back to the shorter sprints to improve his raw speed.
In 2014, his world outlook changed when, in a performance that shocked even himself, he became just the second British teenager to clock a time of under 45 seconds for the 400m at the Glasgow Grand Prix, staged at Hampden Park — home of Scotland’s national football team.
“That’s when everybody started to know who I was,” Hudson-Smith says. “I used to call myself ‘The Secret’, because a few people knew what I was doing in training, but it was really a surprise to everyone in 2014 when I burst onto the scene.
“But my inner circle always had a plan.”
From there though, his career was a slow burn.
He reached the 400m final at the 2016 Olympics in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil (finishing eighth), before missing the delayed 2020 Games in Tokyo, Japan, five years later — mental health was an issue for him during the Covid-19 pandemic.
There was more incremental improvement and a move to a new training camp in the U.S. state of Florida helped him arrive in Paris as the European record-holder and one of the favourites for gold. Only an unexpected finish and personal best from the previously unheralded Hall denied him the ultimate prize as Hudson-Smith broke his own European record with a time of 43.44 seconds.
“I think I’ve always had potential but I have ironed out mistakes and learned from the past in terms of diet, injuries and building a team that is more suited to me,” Hudson-Smith says. “For the past two or three years, I’ve got a national record and a European record and medalled every year. That’s just a testament to the team I’ve got and how it’s come together.
“I’ll be honest, I never expected to be in this position as an Olympian or even a 400m runner. When I was growing up I always envisaged being a footballer.
“I had to learn the event, learn about track and field, and I’ve never been one of those athletes who was always going to do well. I was an athlete who was always going to be good but it didn’t really explode until 10 years ago.
“When I moved to America, that was another lifestyle change and I had to grow up a lot. Now that the physical capabilities have matched with the maturity levels, you can see the results.”
After the biggest result of his career, Hudson-Smith has already committed to at least four more years on the track. This means that, injury permitting, he can look ahead to one last Olympics, and this time in his adopted homeland, with the 2028 Games heading for Los Angeles, California.
That’s all a long way from his roots at Castlecroft Primary School and St Peter’s Academy, which is only a few hundred yards from Wolves’ training ground, and he is unlikely to be returning to the States anytime soon.
“I’m still too European,” he jokes, when asked for his reflections on U.S. life. “I drink tea in 28C (82F). I miss the food and I miss corner shops. In England, everyone is very much together. We go to the pub and we get together to celebrate sports and we’re very integrated. I think America is so big that everyone separates themselves and you don’t have that community, whereas in England you have that sense of community that I enjoy.
“My aim is not to leave this career without a gold medal in the next four years, because I want to be up there with the greats, not just of European athletics but of world athletics. I want to be talked about alongside the Michael Johnsons and Wayde van Niekerks and the legends of the sport, but I haven’t really solidified myself yet as the European all-time best.
“Thomas Schonlebe, who was the European record holder (for 35 years until Hudson-Smith beat his time in August last year), has a world (World Championships) gold medal. So even though I’ve run faster and have as many accolades, he has that one trump card, so to define myself as one the best European athletes I feel I need a world (level) medal.
“Not just a World Championships medal but an Olympic medal.
“The Olympics comes every four years, and I came so close. I don’t want to leave the sport without achieving that goal.”
(Top photo: Fabrice Coffrini/AFP via Getty Images)
