SF’s Record-Breaking Olympic Sprinter Has Retired at Age 23
Hanna Barakat has always been fast. As a 7-year-old in a ponytail and tiny cleats on her Little League soccer team, she was abnormally speedy—like Dash-from-the Incredibles speedy. She looked forward to the yearly mile test at school when she’d smoked all the boys in her grade.
“Can’t wait to watch you in the Olympics,” her fourth grade teacher wrote in her yearbook.
In 2020, the LA-born, Palestinian American sprinter made her Olympic debut for the Palestinian National Team, setting the national record for the women’s 100-meter sprint at 12.16 seconds.
Now, less than three years later, Barakat has decided…