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A major betting site FanDuel Sportsbook banned a bettor for raining personal insults at Olympic champion Gabby Thomas before her race which could be responsible for her losing.
A betting website named FanDuel has banned a bettor for distracting Olympic champion Gabby Thomas on the track to land an accumulator win.
The bettor by the X name @mr100kaday posted a video of himself taunting Thomas at the Grand Slam Track in Philadelphia and claimed "It made my parlay win."
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The sprint queen competed in Philadelphia, losing both her races. In her trademark event - the 200m, she was stunned by fellow Olympian Melissa Jefferson-Wooden, who won in a personal best time of 21.99s and added the 100m win as well clocking a world-leading time of 10.73s (the joint tenth fastest time in history) as Thomas finished fourth.
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21:28 - 02.06.2025
It was sweet beating Gabby Thomas - Jefferson-Wooden gushes on record-breaking moments at Grand Slam Track in Philadelphia
With two brilliant feats at the Grand Slam Track in Philadelphia, Melissa Jefferson-Wooden has described the experience of beating Gabby Thomas as 'sweet'.
After her races, Thomas posted on her X page that the unnamed man "followed me around the track as I took pictures and signed autographs for fans (mostly children) shouting personal insults".
The bettor later posted a video of himself taunting Thomas ahead of the 100-meter race alongside a screenshot of a $1,000 parlay bet on FanDuel.
"I made Gabby lose by heckling her. And it made my parlay win," he wrote in a post on X.
Responding to the incident, Grand Slam Track released a statement saying it was conducting a "full investigation into the reprehensible behavior captured on video."
"We are working to identify the individual involved and will take appropriate action as necessary," Grand Slam Track said. "We will implement additional safeguards to help prevent incidents like this in the future. Let us be clear, despicable behavior like this will not be tolerated."
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FanDuel also took to action informing the customer that he had been banned from its platform.
"FanDuel condemns in the strongest terms abusive behavior directed towards athletes," a FanDuel spokesperson said in a statement to ESPN.
"Threatening or harassing athletes is unacceptable and has no place in sports. This customer is no longer able to wager with FanDuel."
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This isn't the first time Thomas has complained about fan harassment. In January, the speedster expressed security concerns about being stalked at American airports, receiving support from fellow American athletes Coco Gauff and Ilona Maher.
Thomas expressed her concerns in a video on her TikTok page, pleading for advice on being stalked by a group of men at airports in America, detailing how "three to six" middle-aged men appeared to be waiting for her in various US airports including Chicago and Miami, even sometimes showing up at her departure gate, which was starting to freak her out.
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19:31 - 02.06.2025
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Sha'Carri Richardson is ready to turn up for the second half of the season, posting a confident message on her X page.
Her Philadelphia experience marks the latest incident involving athletes being targeted by bettors, a troubling trend that Major League Baseball players have said has increased in recent years with the expansion of legal sports betting in the United States.
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