A Car Crash Has Put Tara Davis-Woodhall’s Ultimate Championship in Doubt

Tara Davis-Woodhall says she has not trained since a head-on collision last week left her with a severe concussion, and the Olympic and world long jump champion is now unsure whether she will compete at the inaugural World Athletics Ultimate Championship in Budapest, where the women’s long jump final is scheduled for Friday, Sept. 11.

Davis-Woodhall, 27, described the crash in a post on her Instagram account on Wednesday that carried footage from a dash camera along with photographs of her injuries, FloTrack reported. “Last week I was involved in a head on collision on my way to practice,” she wrote. “I walked away with a concussion and other injuries that have prevented me from training. At this point I’m working with my team and doctors to get healthy, but I’m unsure if I will be ready to compete at Ultimate Championships next week.”

In a video posted with the statement she said she was “lucky and blessed to be alive and no life-threatening injuries” and called the crash “very scary,” NBC Sports reported. She said she was “physically OK,” and added: “Mentally, something’s going on in there.” She said the two cars were moving at roughly 20 mph (32 km/h) at the point of impact and that both were total losses, according to BBC Sport.

“It’s really unfortunate timing; I am at the peak of my training right now,” she said. “I’m as fast as I’ve ever been. I’m as strong as I’ve ever been. So this decision is very difficult for me. I don’t know where I am right now.”

On June 14 she jumped 7.20m at the Los Angeles Grand Prix, a lifetime best and the world lead, and ran a personal best of 12.47 in the 100m hurdles the same afternoon, according to World Athletics. She is ranked first in the world in the long jump. She won the Olympic title in Paris in 2024 with 7.10m, the same year her husband, Hunter Woodhall, won Paralympic gold in the 400m T62, and took the world title in Tokyo last September with 7.13m.

Her only defeat of 2026 came on July 26 at the United States outdoor championships at Icahn Stadium in New York City, where a sixth-round jump of 7.16m that had moved her into the lead was ruled a foul after a protest. Her appeal was rejected, Alyssa Jones won with 6.96m, and Davis-Woodhall lost for the first time since the 2023 World Championships, ending a run of 18 straight wins, NBC Sports reported.

World Athletics has put $10 million into the three-day championship, the largest prize fund the sport has offered, with $150,000 to each individual winner, $75,000 for second place and $40,000 for third. Eight women make up the long jump field, and eighth place pays $10,000. Sebastian Coe, the World Athletics president, has said the pot is arranged so that “every athlete who competes goes home with something.”

Davis-Woodhall qualified twice over, as Olympic champion and as world champion, two of the four routes into the championship. The rest of the field comes from the world rankings and from the winner of the Diamond League Final, held in Brussels on Friday and Saturday, six days before Budapest opens. World Athletics also held back one discretionary entry per event for an athlete who had not qualified, and that window closed on Aug. 17, according to CITIUS Mag’s rundown of the qualification rules.

The graduated return-to-sport progression used in American sports medicine runs to six steps, from light aerobic work through sport-specific drills to competition, with at least 24 hours at each step and a drop back to the previous step if symptoms return, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. She has done no training since the crash, and a staged return to full training begins only once a health care provider clears the athlete.

Davis-Woodhall wrote that more updates would follow. The championship’s opening session, which carries the women’s long jump final, runs from 7 p.m. to 10 p.m. local time on Friday, Sept. 11.