The race is off.
Dolphins wide receiver Tyreek Hill and Olympic gold medalist Noah Lyles have canceled their long-planned showdown due to "complications" and "personal reasons," Lyles said Monday, via the New York Post.
"We were very deep into creating the event," Lyles said. "In fact, it was supposed to happen this weekend. Unfortunately there were some things, complications, personal reasons that it just didn't come to pass, but we were full on.
"We were gonna have a big event, we were going to shut down New York Times Square and everything, we were gonna have all the billboards for the event, it was going to be a lot of fun."
The two world-class athletes participated in a back and forth for some time before they told People Magazine in February that they had agreed to race each other.
Hill boasts 4.29 speed dating back to his 40-yard dash at West Alabama's pro day ahead of the 2016 draft and regularly runs aways from NFL defenders, while Lyles is a three-time Olympic medalist who currently holds the title of "world's fastest man" thanks to taking gold in the 100-meter dash at the 2024 Summer Olympics.
Although Hill won't have a chance to wrest that title away from his cross-sport rival, he did show up for a race over this past weekend, winning the 100-meter dash at the Last Chance Sprint Series prelims with a time of 10.15 seconds. He then held up a sign reading "Noah could never," echoing Lyles' "Tyreek could never" sign the sprinter displayed in February after placing first in a 60M final at the New Balance Indoor Grand Prix.
Lyles, of course, could match that speed and more; his top-10 personal bests in official 100M races all clock in at 9.88 or better, and his personal record stands at 9.79, accomplished during his aforementioned Olympic triumph.
Hill nonetheless remains a showman, both for his impressive 100M time as a 31-year-old NFL player and for fanning the flames of this feud even as a hopeful race against Lyles has been called off.
