LAUSANNE — Usain Bolt has insisted his phenomenal 19.59seconds performance at the Athletissima IAAF Super Grand Prix meeting in Lausanne on Tuesday was a message to no one, but himself.
"I wasn’t here to impress my rivals but to check out at what level I am at the moment," said Bolt, who finished almost a full second ahead of American Olympic 400m champion Lashawn Merritt.
"I pushed myself right to the end because I wanted to really test myself," he added, noting that he aims to peak for the upcoming IAAF World athletics championships in Berlin next month.
Bolt’s run in the downpour in a 60-degree weather and in a -0.9m/s headwind, is the fourth fastest ever over the half-lap.
The time is beaten by his very own 19.30secs world record, Michael Johnson’s 19.32 and Tyson Gay’s world-leading 19.58, accomplished five weeks ago in warm weather and a following wind in New York.
Given the same conditions as Gay, respective track experts believed the time could even been close to his world mark.
Bolt, however, was not too quick to pull the trigger on such comments, adding that his main focus is to get in shape for the worlds.
"I wasn’t even thinking about what I could have done if it had been good weather," he said.
"Would I have broken the world record (19.30sec) had it been better weather? I don’t even think of it in those terms, I was just trying to test myself.
"I didn’t think it possible to get so much pleasure in running in these conditions," he added.
The race was Bolt first 200m of the season.
He has the fastest 100m clocking this year, at 9.86seconds accomplished when winning the Jamaican title last month.
– Gary Smith contributed to this article
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