Last month, when Gabby Thomas was asked to share her perspective on doping bans, her stance was clear. The 28-year-old wants lifetime bans for any coaches implicated in positive tests, rather than seeing them rejoin the sport. “No me importa idc idc idc … Si entrenas bajo un entrenador que se sabe que es dopador… eres cómplice.” stated Thomas. The statements could also be seen as a not-so-subtle dig at Dennis Mitchell, President and coach of Star Athletics International Club. The club that has trained athletes like Sha’Carri Richardson and Melissa Jefferson-Wooden, and has defeated 52 nations in the overall medal tally at the World Athletics Championships.
The 2025 Tokyo World Athletics Championship has wrapped up, and it has been special. A record number of nations win medals at WCH Tokyo 25. A total of 53 countries won medals over nine exciting days at the 20th World Championships, breaking the previous record of 46 set in Osaka 2007 and later equaled in Budapest 2023. But if we bring in a club into the rankings of the most medals won, Mitchell’s Club takes the win, as the Star Athletics now has a portfolio of a total of 11 medals from the 2025 Tokyo World Athletics Championships.
The club contributes around 42.3% medals to the USA tally of 26. They are way ahead of any other nation except Kenya and Jamaica. Not only does Star Athletics have more medals than these nations, they even have more gold medals (9 Gold, and 2 Silver medals). In fact, the USA won 16 golds in Tokyo, and the club contributed to more than half of those.
Melissa Jefferson-Wooden did the treble. At first, it was the 100m where she clocked a time of 10.61s for the win. This was followed by another win in the 200m, where she clocked a personal best of 21.68s. Then there was 4x100m relays, which the US team won in 41.75 seconds. The team that ran in the finals of the 4x100m relays, included Melissa Jefferson, Twanisha Terry, Sha’Carri Richardson, and Kayla White, all trained under the same club, Star Athletics in Florida.
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Moreover, Christian Coleman ran the 4x100m relay in Tokyo, alongside Kenny Bednarek, Courtney Lindsey, and Noah Lyles, and won the relays in 37.29s. In the same 4x100m, the runners-up were Canada, in 37.55s. Their team had Aaron Brown, Jerome Blake, Brendon Rodney, and Andre De Grasse. Interestingly, Coleman, Bednarek and Brown are also from Star Athletics. Kung-Fu Kenny also ran in the 200m, where he finished just behind Noah Lyles (19.52), taking the Silver medal in 19.58s.
However, though Star Athletics shines bright with its overall World Athletics medal tally, the club’s president received rather and indirect scrutiny from Gabby Thomas in August 2025.
¿Llamó Gabby Thomas a Sha’Carri Richardson’s Club?
Last month, triple Olympic champion Gabby Thomas has suggested drastic new measures to try and combat the doping issues currently plaguing athletics. She shared her thoughts after the Ukrainian triple jumper Maryna Bekh-Romanchuk received a four-year ban for multiple whereabouts failures and a positive test.
She suggested to instill practices of banning the coaches who were also involved in doping. She stated, “No me importa idc idc idc … Si entrenas bajo un entrenador que se sabe que es dopador… eres cómplice.” This wasn’t any direct attack on any coach, at least not on the surface level. Even Justin Gatlin found the timings of her statements odd. This is where things get interesting.
Back in 1998, Dennis Mitchell, the man who made Star Athletics and a former sprinter himself, was banned for two years after testing positive for elevated testosterone levels. Initially, the reasons cited by him were not accepted by the authorities. Later, during the BALCO investigation, Mitchell testified under oath that his coach, Trevor Graham, was involved in the same.
Now, Thomas’ forceful plea comes right in the middle of multiple track and field scandals. Whether or not Thomas’s comments were a proposed plan in a bid to clean up the sport from the root level. Though she didn’t intend to target any one person in specific, she believes track and field, as a whole, needs to be and do better.