Alfred ends career-best campaign hungry for more in 2027
Key Points(5)
- Julien Alfred has finished the most accomplished season of her career, but the Paris 2024 Olympic 100-meter champion is already clear about what comes next.
- After collecting silver in the 100m at the World Athletics Ultimate Championship in Budapest, Alfred closed a campaign that featured personal bests in both the 100m and 200m, a Diamond League title and World Indoor silver.
- Before turning her attention fully to 2027 and the World Championships in Beijing, however, the St.
- Lucian wants something much simpler: a genuine break.
- Beach, family and no track Alfred’s first priority is to return home, reconnect with family and enjoy life away from the demands of elite competition.
Julien Alfred has finished the most accomplished season of her career, but the Paris 2024 Olympic 100-meter champion is already clear about what comes next.
After collecting silver in the 100m at the World Athletics Ultimate Championship in Budapest, Alfred closed a campaign that featured personal bests in both the 100m and 200m, a Diamond League title and World Indoor silver.
Before turning her attention fully to 2027 and the World Championships in Beijing, however, the St. Lucian wants something much simpler: a genuine break.
Beach, family and no track
Alfred’s first priority is to return home, reconnect with family and enjoy life away from the demands of elite competition.
“I want to enjoy the offseason,” Alfred said. “I just want to go back home to Saint Lucia, on the beach, party, enjoy my island, nothing about track and field whatsoever, and think about next year when the next season starts.”
That reset will eventually give way to preparation for another major championship season.
Alfred plans to return to training with coach Edrick Floréal at the University of Texas, where she will have a larger group of training partners around her.
The group includes fellow Saint Lucians Naomi London and Jady Emmanuel, World Under-20 double champion Mia Maxwell and Maxwell’s twin, Mariah.
For Alfred, that expanded training environment could be particularly important as she works to correct the area she identified as the biggest weakness of her 2026 campaign.
Fixing the start
Her acceleration out of the blocks was inconsistent throughout the season, and Alfred knows exactly where she intends to begin her preparations.
“I have a lot to work on, especially the start,” she said. “It’s been really inconsistent this season, so now I know what I have to work on.”
The additional training partners should provide more opportunities to replicate race situations and sharpen that part of her sprinting.
“Now I have a lot more training partners to line up with in practice so I can get the repetition and get it under my belt, which I think I was lacking all season.”
Alfred’s relatively light competition schedule makes that need for repetition particularly understandable.
She raced the 100m only seven times in 2026, one fewer than in 2025, when her training was heavily geared toward speed endurance. During her final two collegiate seasons in 2022 and 2023, she competed 30 times combined.
Monaco highlighted a special season
The defining performance of Alfred’s year came in July at the Monaco Diamond League.
She clocked 21.51 seconds in the 200m, a performance that moved her to fourth on the all-time list for the event.
For Alfred, however, the significance of 2026 extended beyond any single time or medal.
She said the season also reflected substantial growth in how she handles setbacks.
“I’ve been learning how to lose and how to bounce back from that, so I’m not the type anymore to beat myself up after a race,” Alfred said. “Now I’ve become a lot more lenient on myself and give myself a lot more grace.”
That change in perspective has become an important part of her development.
“As you’ve seen, every year I’ve progressed. I’ve got better every single time I line up, and that’s because my mental game has gotten a lot better.”
Carrying Saint Lucia with her
For Alfred, the progress is also about something larger than her own results.
She remains acutely aware of what it means to compete internationally while representing a small Caribbean nation.
“Now I am a lot more grateful for where I’m at, knowing I get a chance to represent an island, a tiny island of 238 square miles, and it’s always a proud moment for me. I look at the positive things in life.”
That representation has taken on added meaning as young people in Saint Lucia have watched Alfred carry their national flag onto the world stage.
Some of her family members were also in Budapest to see her compete in person for the first time.
With the 2026 campaign finally complete, Alfred can now enjoy the people and place that remain at the center of her journey before the work toward Beijing begins.
For the moment, the track can wait. Saint Lucia comes first.
