In his first individual sprint of 2012, the 100m and 200m world record holder blitzed the field as he crossed the line in a dazzling 9.82 seconds, fellow Jamaican Michael Frater his closest rival - a distant 0.18sec behind.

As far as ominous warnings go it doesn’t get any better than this, however, the ‘Lightning Bolt’ was adamant there’s plenty more to come as he looks to peak for London in less than three months’ time.

In his first individual sprint of 2012, Bolt blitzed the field as he crossed the line in a dazzling 9.82 seconds

“It’s a good start, I would say,” said Bolt, who erased the previous season-leading time of 9.90sec by world champion Yohan Blake. “I feel better than last year, so

I’m definitely happy with myself. I don’t think my execution was perfect, but I think for my first race it was good.”

The 25-year-old exploded out of the blocks to take control by the 40m-mark, although he was far from happy with his start as he strives to break his world record of 9.58 seconds at the summer showpiece.

“I always try to work on my first 40 metres because the last 40 metres is always the best part of my race,” he said. “So over the season as I get more fit and get more fluent it will definitely get better.”

Indeed, injury and false starts, which saw him disqualified from last year’s 100m final at the world championships, are shaping as Bolt’s biggest obstacle to repeating his Beijing heroics.

While there was no jumping the gun on this occasion, the same can’t be said for the rest of the field with two of his rivals caught leaving early.

But despite the disruptions, Bolt kept his cool (as always) to put on a show for a delighted Kingston crowd.

Meanwhile, Bolt’s biggest rival in London, compatriot Blake, benefitted by focusing his attention on the 200m as he too posted the fastest time of the year, finishing in 19.91sec.

No doubt Bolt was taking notice, though, and the world awaits his response when he returns to the track in Rome later this month.

MONACO — Jamaican sprint icon Usain Bolt and Australia's Sally Pearson, the world 100m hurdles champion, were named athletes of the year by athletics' governing body the IAAF here Saturday.

Bolt, the Olympic 100 metres champion, wins the award for the third time after being honoured in 2008 and 2009.

This year the 25-year-old notably retained his 200m crown at the world championships in Daegu where he also helped Jamaica defend the 4x100m relay in a new world record time of 37.04sec.

In South Korea Bolt, however, squandered his chance to defend his world 100m crown when he was disqualified from the final for a false start, allowing compatriot Yohan Blake to succeed him.

It was in Daegu that Pearson, 25, produced the fourth fastest time in history, and the fastest in 19 years, for the women's hurdles event which she dominated in a time of 12.21sec.

She becomes the first athlete from Oceania to be honoured as such by the IAAF since the awards were introduced in 1988.

Usain Bolt is faster.

Liu Xiang wondered recently whether Bolt is from another planet. “You do not belong to the earth,” he told him at a Shanghai Diamond League press conference in a comment which obviously lost very little in translation.

Tyson Gay is also faster and, going on their head-to-head record since the 2007 Osaka world championships, mentally tougher.

So how come we’re all talking about Asafa Powell again? Well, one obvious answer would be that, of the big three of sprinting, Powell is the only one going round at the minute.

Bolt started his season with a sizzling 19.56 200 metres in Kingston, won in Shanghai and then ran the second-fastest time ever over 300 metres in Ostrava late last month. Now he has a stiff and sore achilles tendon.

Gay broke 45 seconds for 400 metres in April, making him the first man to have a sub-10, a sub-20 and a sub-45 to his name, and then broke Tommie Smith’s world record for the straight 200 metres in a Manchester street race. He is out of the weekend’s New York Diamond League with soreness in his hamstring. According to his agent, who is also the meeting manager, told Reuters: “There’s a readiness needed to run the 100 metres and he does not have that.”

Not injured, just not ready, then. Result the same _ not running.

Meanwhile, Powell just keeps churning out fast 100-metre races like they were going outof style. On Thursday night at Rome’s Golden Gala meeting, he ran 9.82 seconds, nipping a hundredth of a second off the year’s best he set in Ostrava. This was despite dwelling in the blocks, his reaction time _ 0.214 seconds _ more akin to a 400 metres runner than a straight-line speedster.

It was Powell’s 63^rd wind-legal sub-10 and 70^th overall. Nice numbers those.

Powell might accumulate sub-10s like Steve Waugh used to accumulate Test runs for Australia, but he performs more like Steve’s more profligate twin brother, Mark.

Now Mark Waugh could bat, and on several notable occasions he put his head down and ground out big scores just like his flinty brother, but he could also give his wicket away with all the misplaced generosity of a drunk on a spree.

Asafa Powell runs like that. For all his prodigious talent, there are times when you wonder just what on earth he is doing. Like when he gave away the silver medal when Gay had him beaten in the Osaka 100 final, or when he faded to fifth in the Beijing Olympic final. Or, when he lost to Justin Gatlin at the Prefontaine Meeting in 2005 when even a cursory ‘dip’ at the finish line would have got him home the winner.

For the most part, Powell’s problems have come at major championships. When others step up, he seems to shrink. Kinder folk have suggested he consult the sports psychologist; harsher critics, many of whom would not run for a bus for fear of losing, go for the ‘choker’ term.

Whatever _ 2010 is not a major championship year and Powell is already shaping up for his best season since 2006, also a non-championship year.

Back then, Powell did win his only individual gold medal _ at the Commonwealth Games on the Melbourne Cricket Ground. He also compiled one of the most impressive seasons ever by a sprinter. After Gatlin sidelined himself with a positive drug test in April, Powell had no challenger (Gay was emerging, but not yet a major force; Bolt was still a junior prodigy struggling to overcome injuries).

Powell equalled the world record he shared with Gatlin (whose performance was subsequently annulled) with 9.77 in Gateshead in early June, and equalled it again in Zurich, ahead of Gay, just over two months later.

In between, he ran 9.85 in Paris and Rome, then 9.86 in Stockholm. He again ran 9.86 in Berlin at the start of September, and won at the World Athletic Final in Stuttgart a couple of weeks later.

This year, Powell again seems to be in that sort of form. He has reportedly lost weight by paying a bit more attention to his diet and appears more relaxed and happy _ though outwardly, it must be said, he gives the impression of being relaxed and happy most of the time.

Presumably, both Bolt and Gay will be back in mint physical condition soon. If they are, Powell will take some beating this year. If not, he is once again showing he is capable of carrying the show on his own.

Duncan Kibet Video Interview

© 2009 The Runner's Tribe, all rights reserved. Published Friday September 18, 2009

Brought to you by Edward Ovadia

Brought to you by Edward Ovadia who is in Berlin with official IAAF accreditation covering the championships for Runnerstribe.com

Usain Bolt is a phenomenon. There's no doubt about that now. The hype that surrounds him is very real, and the attention he garners is incredible.

True to his partying form, Usain Bolt's press conference was held in a nightclub, instead of the usual team hotels. And just like any good nightclub, it was invite only, and you had to have your name on the guest list. People were getting turned away by the dozen. While other press conferences were half empty if at all, Bolt's was standing room only, with people pushing their way through to get closer to the man.

The Jamaican club aptly called Yaam, received a whole Jamaican inspired Puma deck out in honour of Bolt, who joked on stage, got presented with his new 'Bolt Arms', strap on arms to save him doing his own lightning bolt move, and the new Yaam sprint spikes, built exclusively for the tall Jamaican. Named after his favourite food (which he doesn't seem to enjoy as much anymore, having eaten his fill as a kid), the bright orange spikes are hoping to give Bolt an even bigger edge.

But most interesting is the marketing surrounding Bolt. There are events every day to help publicise Bolt and Jamaica, Bolt's photo is plastered around the city, and the green and yellow of Jamaica is the one constant all over Berlin. Even the giveaways had every kind of freebie you could imagine, all plastered with yellow and green, and Bolt's face. No need to carry anything else apart from Bolt around.

Bolt has been marketed very well, and they've succeeded in creating an aura, a phenomenon surrounding Bolt, bigger than the man himself.

It's fantastic that there's someone who can inspire this kind of fan support, the kind that used to be reserved for the footy codes and cricket. It's the kind of inspiration that can only help the sport, and which provides something enticing and yet tangible that kids can dream about. Whether it's too much pressure and expectation to put on one person, a person who can get injured or not perform to their best, will have to wait to be seen. But Bolt doesn't have to do much more to cement his immortality in this sport, and the success he is having in converting more people to being track fans is just what the sport needs.

 

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'Hills are speedword in disguise '
Frank Shorter

One of my favourite press conference stories concerns the great Ethiopian runner Miruts Yifter after he won the 1980 Moscow Olympic 10,000 metres.

I wasn't there, but the story goes that a Finnish journalist asked a convoluted tactical question which boiled down to what would have happened if Lasse Viren had made a move with five laps to go instead of with 300 metres to go.

The question was translated into Amharic (for Yifter), English, French (the IOC languages) and Russian. Yifter gave a brief reply which travelled back the same torturous route.

"I would have run faster," said the man known as "Yifter the Shifter".

Well tonight in the Olympic stadium, Tyson Gay found out what happens when you run faster than you ever have in your life and venture into territory which had hitherto belonged exclusively to Usain Bolt.

Simply put, Bolt just runs faster.

Consider this, Tyson Gay ran 9.71 seconds, a time bettered before last night only by Bolt's 9.69 world record set at the Beijing Olympics. Instead of the gap to the Olympic champion closing, in fact it widened. Gay ran within 0.02 of where Bolt had been, but Bolt ran a world record 9.58 and the American is now further behind than he's ever been!

Take that. To his credit, Gay was not dismayed at this turn of events. After the race, he still professed his confidence that he could also run that fast.

Asafa Powell, third in 9.84, was almost a spectator. The former world record holder has talked a good race all season, and indeed he ran about where the world record was before first he and now Bolt took it over. But injuries had not allowed him to get into shape to run down in the 9.5s.

Powell would, he said, be going home to train to run 9.58. It will take some doing.

Bolt was asked in the press conference whether he had taken the sport into a new dimension. Most would say he has, but he seemed to suggest he hasn't. Perhaps he is happy for everyone else to be in awe of him, but he does not want to be in awe of himself.

Bolt did allow that 9.58 was something special (presumably royalties are on their way to Bruce as you read this) and that he was proud of himself for being the first man there (he is, of course, the first and only man to the 9.6s, too).

Bolt also explained his pre-race joking around. He works hard all year to prepare to race the 100, he said, so he can fool around on the starting line. As soon as the starter says, 'on your marks', however, he is back in focus. You'd better believe that.

As in Beijing, Bolt nailed his start when it mattered, and led when he came out of his drive phase. "When I got to 50 in the lead I knew it was going to be hard to pass me because that's the best part of my race."

As Steve Cram wrote in a BBC column recently, Bolt is now enjoying that window in his career during which great performances seem to come almost at will and without effort. The latter is, of course, an illusion: Bolt works damn hard, but the impression he gives is otherwise.

In the meantime, his rivals, chiefly Gay and Powell right now, but others will aspire to the standards Bolt is setting, watch on in wonder.

"I knew it was humanly possible to run that fast," said Gay. "I'm just sorry that it wasn't me," he added ruefully.

"I knew I needed to run the perfect race to win," Powell observed, "but I'm not 100 percent healthy to really challenge 9.58."

The perfect race: Powell needed to run it to have a chance; so, too, did Gay. Trouble was, it was Usain Bolt who most closely approached perfection this day.




 

Len Johnson was The Melbourne Age athletics writer for over 20 years, covering five Olympics, 10 world championships and five Commonwealth Games. He is the author of The Landy Era, From Nowhere to the Top of the World, and a former national class distance runner (2.19.32 marathon) who trained with Chris Wardlaw and Robert de Castella.

Vili runner's tribe interview - Berlin World Champs

By MATT DAWSON

I recall watching the Men's 1500 race at one of the televised Grand Prix Meets at the start of 2000. The race was won in a slow time of 3:42, in windy conditions. Commentator, Jane Flemming slated the performance of Australia's middle distance runners saying that in an Olympic year that the winning time of 3:42 wasn't up to scratch. She put it simply: "these guys [top guys] should be breaking 3:40 every time they step on the track"- harsh criticism, but essentially on the money.

2000-2004 was probably the lowest ebb of Australia's 1500m stocks. This point is demonstrated by Australia fielding just one runner at the Sydney Olympics (Nick Howarth with a personal best of 3:39) and none at the Athens Olympics in 2004.

The problem wasn't necessarily lack of talent or hard work, but rather depth. Abdi, Chisholm, Fountain, Mottram (focusing on the 5000m), Stevenson etc gave it a red hot crack. But the level of domestic competition just wasn't there.

Thankfully, there has been a slow resurgence since that period. Thankfully, we're in a now in a position to focus on getting runners into the low 3:30s and eventually breaking the 3:30 barrier. In 2000, we had four men under 3:40 (Abdi, Howarth, Mottram and Stevenson). By 2003, it was just one (Abdi).

By 2007, that number had reached nine (Abdi, Birmingham, Bromley, Chisholm, Fountain, Kealey, Riseley, Roff and Woods) with a plethora of runners in the 3:40-3:42 range.

At the Bejiing Games last year, Australia had two representatives in the 1500m, Mitchell Kealey and Jeff Riseley. Unfortunately, both were quite seriously ill at the time and unable to advantage beyond their respective heats. Nevertheless, their qualification has set a benchmark, from which Australia's 1500 metre men can strive to improve on in London 2012.

So far in 2009, there have been five runners under 3:40, Riseley 3.32, Roff 3.34, Birmingham 3.35, Gregson 3.37, and Huffer 3.39. Riseley's performance at the World Champs in the Berlin, in finishing 10th in his Semi-Final was the first time an Aussie male has advanced beyond the heat of a World Championship or Olympics since Craig Mottram did so at the 2001 World Champs. This was a very promising performance from Riseley, who will be looking to improve on both his PB of 3:32 and his ability to run competitively in major championship races, in the lead up to London 2012.

But the list of challengers on the injured or out of form list makes the event look very competitive in the lead-up to the London Olympics in 2012. The likes of Mottram 3.33, Fountain 3.33, Abdi 3.36, Kealey 3.36, Woods 3.37, Chisholm 3.37, Hoffman 3.39 and Bromley 3.39 returning to form or from injury will make for great races over the coming domestic seasons.

Australia's recent improvement over middle and long distance track events has been matched in other Anglo-Saxon countries, with traditions of producing distance stars. Great Britain, New Zealand and United States have all seen vast improvements in their distance runners. The bronze medals of Craig Mottram (5km) at the 2005 Worlds in Helsinki and Nick Willis (1500m) in the Beijing Olympics last year has proven that Anglo-Saxon runners, can not only run fast times, but also compete with the Africans for medals at major championships.

The likes of Coe, Ovett, Cram (GB), Doyle, Scammell and Hillardt (Aust) and Walker (NZ) not so long ago showed us that there is no reason why runners from Anglo-Saxon countries can't stick it to the Africans over 1500 metres.

My prediction? Simon Doyle's Australian record will be long gone by the 2012 Games. And an Australian under 3.30? Who knows, but there is no better time to do it than with the 1500 metre crop we have right now!

 

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'My prediction? Simon Doyle's Australian record will be long gone by the 2012 Games'
Matt Dawson

Pirrenee Steinert & Caitlin Willis Berlin World Champs Interviews August 2009

© 2009 The Runner's Tribe, all rights reserved. Published Tuesday August 18, 2009

Brought to you by Edward Ovadia who is in Berlin with official IAAF accreditation covering the championships for Runnerstribe.com

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