"Sometimes I joke with my girlfriend maybe when I'm 30, I will go to NFL" - Kenny Bednarek expresses desire to pursue a career in football

Kenny Bednarek has claimed he sometimes jokes with his girlfriend about shifting to the NFL when he turns 30 as he was associated with the sport and considered pursuing a career in it. Early in his life, Bednarek moved from Tulsa, Oklahoma, to Rice Lake, Wisconsin, where he started playing football for Rice Lake High School.

Bednarek was the 200m silver medalist at the 2020 Tokyo Olympics. He repeated his feat at the 2024 Paris Olympics and won silver with 19.62, sandwiched between Botswanian sprinter Letsile Tebogo and fellow American Noah Lyles.

Amid the back-and-forth of NFL and track following the Paris Olympic campaign, the Running Effect podcast host, Dominic Schlueter, asked Kenny Bedanrek whether he ever considered a career in football for his history with the sport. During his junior and senior years, Bednarek scored 17 touchdowns, as a kick returner, wide receiver, and on jet sweeps.

The 25-year-old shared that he would have flourished in football had he stuck with it, since he had bettered his speed from running on the track.

"I feel like with my work ethic, I definitely did. Because, I mean, honestly, that was something that I wanted to pursue. I mean, I love track, but when I was younger I was also like, oh, I dream about being in the NFL one day...Sometimes I joke with my girlfriend maybe when I'm 30, I will go to the NFL," he said (via The Running Effect podcast) [22:01].

"I feel like if I stuck with football, I wouldn't have had an opportunity of trying to be in the NFL. I mean, first of all, I got speed. The only thing that I really needed to work on was everything else, you know, agility, hands, and then just running the route tree," Bedanrek added.

Kenny Bednarek's first love was football

In the Journey to Gold podcast, Kenny Bednarek recalled his experience of running cross-country races and stated that his first love was football.

"I got out of cross country and then I solely just focused on track and football and you know football was my first love," he said [2:50].

Bednarek also participated in the 4x100m relay at the 2024 Paris Olympics but failed to win a medal as Christian Coleman botched the baton handover. Besides his Olympic medals, Bednarek won the 200m silver at the 2022 World Championships.

Earlier in 2024, he secured the 4x100m relay victory at the World Relays in Nassau, alongside his teammates Courtney Lindsey, Kyree King, and Noah Lyles.