Gabby Thomas, a three-time Olympic gold medalist, called out a sports bettor on social media Monday, saying he verbally harassed her during the Grand Slam Track meet this past weekend in Philadelphia. The man allegedly followed her around the track, shouting insults.
“This grown man followed me around the track as I took pictures and signed autographs for fans (mostly children) shouting personal insults,” Thomas wrote on social media. “Anybody who enables him online is gross.”
The bettor posted a video on social media Monday showing him heckling Thomas before the women’s 100-meter dash Sunday at Franklin Field. In the clip, he can be heard calling Thomas a “choke artist” and saying he was rooting for Melissa Jefferson-Wooden because her husband is Black, while making a disparaging reference to the fact that Thomas’ fiancé is White. Thomas went on to finish fourth in the race and placed third overall in the women’s short sprints group.
“I made Gabby lose by heckling her. And it made my parlay win,” the bettor wrote on social media, alongside the video and screenshots of two winning parlays totaling $2,524.08.
In a second post, Thomas said the “heckling is tolerable,” but “it’s [the] following me around the…
