Usain Bolt, who set the track world on fire four years ago with a dominant performance in Beijing, looks like he’s going to do it again in London.
Usain Bolt, 25, the Jamaican world recordholder and defending Olympic champion, exploded down the track at London’s Olympic Stadium and won the gold medal Sunday night in a blazing time of 9.63. It broke his Olympic record set in Beijing — 9.69 — and was just .05 off the world record of 9.58 he set in 2009.
During introductions, Usain Bolt made a series of hand gestures, then smiled.
Much had been made about the possibility of bad weather preventing fast times on the Olympic Stadium track.
But on Sunday night, just before 10 p.m. London time, when the fastest men in the world lined up to see who is fastest, the weather was perfect.
Yohan Blake, Usain Bolt ‘s training partner and world champion from last year, was second in 9.75 seconds.
Team USA’s Justin Gatlin, the 2004 Olympic champion who served a four-year doping suspension ending in 2010, earned the bronze with a time of 9.79.
Tyson Gay of the USA was fourth (9.80) and Ryan Bailey of the USA was fifth (9.88).
Gay, 29, who was battling injuries in 2008 and didn’t make the final, was in tears in the mixed zone after the race.
“I don’t think I could go back and do nothing else,” Gay said, choking up. “I feel like I ran with the field. I just came up short. That’s all I did.”
Gay is the second-fastest man in history at 9.69 seconds.
And once again Jamaica gets the better of the USA in the sprint rivalry. On Saturday night, in the women’s 100, Jamaica won gold and bronze and the USA got silver.
