Donavan Brazier, the 2019 World champion at 800m, will miss next week’s USA Track and Field Outdoor Championships and the rest of 2023, extending an 11-month absence from competition amid injury.
A representative for Brazier said Wednesday that he will not race again until he is 100% healthy.
“We know how good [Donavan] is, and our target in on Paris [Olympics 2024],” Brazier’s coach, Pete Julian, said Saturday, according to LetsRun.com.
Brazier, 26, lowered the American record to 1:42.34 in winning the 2019 World title. He did not qualify for the Tokyo Olympic team while racing at Olympic Trials on a broken tibia.
He dealt with bursitis in his right foot in 2022, when he had a bye onto the world team as reigning champion. He was eliminated in the first-round heats at those worlds on July 20, his most recent.
Since, Brazier underwent heel surgeries later that July (to correct a Haglund’s deformity) and again in February, according to LetsRun.
In Brazier’s absence, the top U.S. men’s 800m runners include Clayton Murphy, who was third and ninth at the last two Olympics, and Tokyo Olympic semifinalist Bryce Hoppel. The top three at USATF Outdoors in Eugene, Oregon, next week are likely to make up the world team.