Grant is golden.
Grant Holloway blazed down the track in Paris in the 110-meter hurdles on Thursday and with each step — and each leap over the event’s 10 hurdles — raced into Hampton Roads immortality.
When the gold medal was draped over Holloway, the Grassfield High graduate became the first athlete from Chesapeake to win an individual Olympic event. And he’s part of an exclusive club of Hampton Roads athletes to win individual gold at the Games. That list now includes Holloway, 26, and just three others:
- Gabby Douglas , who was born in Newport News and later moved to Virginia Beach and there spent her formative years at Excalibur Gymnastics, won the all-around gymnastics gold medal (and a team gold) at the London Olympics in 2012. Douglas also won team gold in 2016.
- Portsmouth’s LaShawn Merritt won the 400-meter gold medal at the 2008 Beijing Olympics, and won a second gold medal that year with the 4×400 relay team. In 2016, Merritt won bronze in the 400 and gold in the 4×400 at the Rio de Janeiro Games.
- Norfolk’s Pernell “Sweet Pea” Whitaker was the first Hampton Roads athlete to win individual gold when he dominated the lightweight boxing competition at the 1984 Olympics in Los Angeles.