'His
stride is wildernesses of freedom: the world rolls under the long
thrust of his heel,' wrote Ted Hughes. The poet saw a jaguar trapped
behind cage bars in a zoo and imagined its dream, turning the world on
its axis with each stride of its giant paws. When Bolt runs as freely as
he did in last night’s 200m qualifier it must feel like that, too.
Each
pace a revolution, lapping not just a track, but a planet, kicking off
into air and landing, whole continents gobbled up and still twirling
beneath the traction of his feet.
Float on: Bolt barely touches the ground when during his sprints
If it is possible for a man to
glide, to skim across the surface at the Olympic Stadium, that is what
Bolt achieved. He stopped running flat out before he had left the bend,
completing the race a blur of pure confidence. Bolt knows his place at
these Games, and it is in front, in charge, a London street ahead of the
rest.
On Thursday night he
will attempt to create his masterpiece. Just before nine o’clock Bolt
will set out to run a race so powerful, so extraordinary, so
unprecedented that in sporting terms it will make the world spin. With
each stride Bolt will be tearing a page, a name, an Olympiad, from the
history book.
No
predecessor, from Walter Tewkesbury, the first gold medallist in Athens
in 1896 to Shawn Crawford in the same city in 2004, got to keep that
precious gold medal over 200m. After last night’s semi-final, despite
recording the fifth-fastest qualifying time, Bolt is now the 6-1 on
favourite to do just that.
This
is Bolt’s Olympics, every bit as much as in Beijing. When the parochial
thrill of the British medal haul has faded, the name that will leap
from the page is his. Bolt has redefined his event, and not just through
size. Plenty of people are tall, but they cannot run like Bolt.
And
his is the hardest event, for the entire world is his rival. Not
everybody can afford golf clubs or a sailboat, not every country has
access to a velodrome or the technology required to match British
cycling; but each free and able-bodied person in the world is at liberty
to try to run as fast as he can. Everybody can have a crack at being
Usain Bolt. And only one man is.
Centre of attention: Everyone at the Olympic Stadium (above and below) wants a memory of Bolt
Nobody has come close to
pushing the outside of this particular envelope, the double 100m and
200m. On Sunday night, Bolt executed his first gold medal run to
perfection, setting an Olympic record over the shorter distance. On
Thursday night he will attempt a repeat.
Even
without a record-breaking time, a place in sport’s pantheon will be
assured by gold. The double double has eluded all for one simple reason:
in 24 attempts nobody keeps holds of the 200m crown.Even
double domination of the 100m has only occurred once before, when Carl
Lewis retained his 1984 gold medal in 1988, in Seoul, a race
subsequently discredited by so many positive drugs tests.
Yet
if what Bolt did on Sunday was improbable, his aim this evening had
previously been considered impossible. Even Lewis could not keep hold
of the 200m title, coming second to countryman Joe DeLoach four years
later. Tonight, Bolt is intending to go faster, farther than any man has
gone before. This is athletic evolution. Given the time he ran on
Sunday night, the winner of the first Olympic 100m in 1896, Thomas
Burke, would have been 18m in his wake.
Bolt’s
feats travel, ricochet like gunshots, bounce from satellites, to every
part of the globe. At the Waldensia Primary School in Trelawny, Jamaica
on Sunday, the children, their parents and teachers were gathered in
front of a television to watch the latest exploits of their most famous
ex-pupil. At which point the power failed.
Not
his, obviously: theirs. Bolt’s electricity is very much on full current
here in London, but the same cannot be said of northern Jamaica, where
large swathes missed the sporting highlight of the year.So what happened? At Waldensia Primary, a small girl also triumphed.
Best foot forward: Bolt is preparing to dazzle the world with another 200m title
She produced a pink
battery-operated transistor radio and her friends gathered around that
instead. They heard, rather than saw, Bolt become the fastest man in
Olympic history and then, in pictures that have gone around the world
via Skype, they shared his joy with whooping, cheering, table-slapping
abandon. And that was just the adults.
Bolt
brings happiness, no doubt of that. His great rival Yohan Blake, who
recorded the fastest time in the semi-finals, although he almost slowed
to the point of madness in the last 20m, tries to match his showmanship,
but he is a young man and always looks slightly self-conscious in his
posturing. Bolt acts as if born to it.
For
a man said to be scared stiff of disqualification through false-start, a
fate that befell him at the World Championships last year, he showed
little sign of it at the start here, body-popping to the music before
settling down in the blocks.
This
is an athlete who tweeted a picture of his 3am companions having won
the 100m: the Swedish women's handball team. He thinks British
footballers — and he is perfectly serious in angling for a trial at
Manchester United, by the way — are encouraged to settle down too early.
Don’t tell Sir Alex Ferguson.
Now the stage is set. Bolt is the
marquee name of these Games, and legitimately, too. There is much to
celebrate in his athletic feats, no matter that the sport lends itself
to doubt and suspicion. A man wins Olympic gold with his laces undone,
teasing the crowd, and people tend to ask questions.
Best foot forward: Bolt is preparing to dazzle the world with another 200m title
Stroll in the park: Bolt made light work of his semi-final, cruising home in the final stages
The fastest man of all time
claims to prepare on breakfasts of chicken nuggets and parties with off
duty Swedish athletes and some wonder how so? Yet, so consistent over
four years, Bolt’s success makes perfect sense.
It
had always been thought that if an athlete of his dimensions could
achieve the explosive speed of the squat sprinters from the blocks, then
his giant steps would take him past the field like no man before. We
have been anticipating Bolt for some time; we just haven’t seen his
like.
So what we will
see at the Olympic Stadium tonight is entirely logical. Bolt is still
the slowest starter on the track, as he should be, but once in his
rhythm, cannot be caught. That is even truer over 200m than 100, where
he has more time to get going.
The
longer race was always his favourite, his feats over the shorter
distance merely a bonus. The biggest cat on the track, Bolt is the
fastest man in the world almost by accident. What happens tonight is by
design. You’ll believe a man can fly.
