By Gary Smith, World-Track
PARIS — Usain Bolt says he is not one bit concerned with those skeptical about his abilities to break world records without the use of enhancing substances.
The towering Jamaican resurrected the sprinting fraternity at the Beijing Olympic Games last summer, when exploded to world record times to win the men’s 100m and 200m.
His meteoric rise to stardom, which manufactured 9.69seconds in the 100m and 19.30seconds over the 200m have raised a few eyebrows. Bolt insisted he has never used performance enhancing drugs and said he is not worried about the speculations.
"It doesn’t bother me," Bolt told Metro. "I’ve been running fast and breaking records since I was 14 years old."
Bolt, who before the 2008 season had only ran 10.03 over the 100m in his only competitive dash before raising the bar to new heights, believes he can go as fast as 9.5seconds.
"I don’t know (how fast I can go), but people think 9.5 seconds. I think I can," he said.
Yet he still prefers the 200m, an event he clocked 20.61sec (after running 20.58) to become the youngest ever world junior champion at 15-year-old seven-year-ago in Kingston, Jamaica.
"I always prefer the 200m as that is the event I have been working on and trying to master since I was young.
"I should be at my peak around the 2012 Olympics."
After multiple post-Olympic commitments and a shake up with a car accident, Bolt returned to what he does best, running fast times.
His 19.59seconds on a soaked track with a slight head-wind at the IAAF Lausanne Grand Prix earlier this month, shows things are back to normal on his path.
But Bolt said he is still not fully in shape and vows to get even faster by the time the World Championships start in Berlin next month.
It will be an interesting showdown between himself and American defending world sprint champion Tyson Gay in both races.
Another man to watch out for his Bolt’s fellow countryman and former world record holder Asafa Powell, who is slowly returning to form, following an ankle injury that slowed him down for months.
All these US journalist and Carl Lewis keeps talking about Bolt rise. Look at the history of Jamaican sprinters, those who decided to run for other countries and those who decided to run for Jamaica. If one wants to look at meteoric rise look at Tyson Gay. His time for winning the Kentuck high school championship was 10.83. That time wouldn’t even place you on the medal stand in the under 17 age group in Jmaicas high school championship. Bolt was running 19.86 before Tyson even touches 20.2 and Tyson is at least 3 years older. It seems to me the history of response to US athletes beign beaten continues. It must be drugs! Now it’s the media instead of athletes throwing the accusation. the stuff that helps athletes to run faster use to be Steriod and HGH, these drugs caused athletes to be heavily muscled. I guess Bolt have some designer drug that makes him tall and slender but runs very fast.
It’s time to start accept defeat and go to the drawing board and try to come back better. No team, individual or country is going to dominate anything every year forever, it’s the way of man. Jamaica has been kicking butt for a long time go back and check Olympic history, you will find names like, Arthur Wint, George Rhoden, Herb McKenly, even Linford Christy and Donovan Bailey, are Jamaican’s that chose to run for other countries. We could have even a more longer dominance but a lot of Jamaican high school male athletes got destroyed by unscrupulous US college coaches in the 1980’s. That’s another story I will leave for another time.
R Taylor you are correct. Let me repeat what I said elsewhere in this magazine: Lets not forget, that twice while Bolt was in his teens, Lamine Diack, president of the IAAF, named USAIN Lightening BOLT as the FUTURE OF SPRINTING. All these hurry come up journalists need to go check their facts before they put pen to paper and show how ignorant you are.
And if they don’t know what IAAF means it means ‘International Association of Athletics Federation’, the ruling body of Track & Field worldwide.
Go figure! Go do your research…you all too dayum lazy!
Hard to follow Waynef”s amazing and accurate jaded history of some of USA’s biggest cheats. But as an american track fan I totally agree with his comments, R. Taylor and PC’s comments as well. Having seen Bolt run in Beijing, you just know he doesn’t need the drugs to be amazing. He is one super human athlete and when he is fit and on, scary things happen! Most of the world believes he is clean, and they should, just watch him. There are athletes that show up once century that everyone will try to question, but if you sit back and watch, you can say he or she is the exception. His biggest problem is not the drug allegations, for they are totally unfounded, but the partying. We are all jealous, and no one can blame an american for being jealous here!