Italian track and field sprinter and long jumper, current 100 m Olympic champion and 60 m European champion. He holds the 100 m European record and 60 m Italian record. He is the first Italian to ever qualify for – and win – the men’s 100 m Olympic final, a feat that he achieved at the 2020 Summer Olympics in Tokyo on 1 August 2021. Jacobs closed the 2020–2021 indoor season as World Leader at 60 m.
Jacobs is the son of Viviana Masini, an Italian woman, and Lamont Marcell Jacobs Sr., an African-American serviceman. His parents met when his father was a United States Army soldier serving at Caserma Ederle in Vicenza, Italy. His father was 18 and his mother was 16 at the time.
His parents married and relocated to Fort Bliss in El Paso, Texas. Three years later, Jacobs was born. However, when he was three weeks old, his father was transferred to South Korea and Jacobs moved to Desenzano del Garda with his mother. His parents split when he was six months old.
Jacobs lives in Rome with his partner Nicole and their two children, Anthony (born 2019) and Megan (born 2021). Jacobs has another son, Jeremy (born 2013), from a previous relationship.
Jacobs has stated that he identifies as “100% Italian”: “Only my muscle fibers are American.” He acquired Italian citizenship in 2010 and began representing his country in 2012 when he was 18 years old. In 2015 he did not renew his American passport.
Link to Wikipedia biography