What a man!
TELEVISION analyst, Olympian and former champion sprint hurdler Mrs Gillian Russell-Love perhaps said it best.
“The mind is a powerful thing,” she told Jamaicans shortly after Mr Usain Bolt defied the odds to win the 100 metres in Beijing for his ninth World Championships gold medal.
It really was all about the mind. For those of us looking on, perhaps the best way to get some inkling of the pressures on Mr Bolt, Mr Justin Gatlin and company in yesterday’s 100m final would be to check ourselves.
For Jamaican television watchers, in the few minutes leading up to the race the tension was near unbearable. Some would have been unable to sit still, pacing, jerking up and down, fists clenched, fingernails torn to bits.
Imagine, then, the pressure on the competitors themselves. For Mr Bolt it had to be enormous.
Plagued by injury and unfitness, Mr Bolt’s build-up to these IAAF World Championships was inadequate. He had very few races, with his best run in the 100m being a relatively moderate 9.87 seconds in July. Even as concern grew about the form of the Jamaican, Mr Gatlin thrived with a succession of 100m below 9.80 seconds.
Stress levels would have been amplified since, in much of the global media, the use and alleged use of illegal performance-enhancing substances had overtaken actual competition as the biggest story.
Since Mr Gatlin had twice served bans — the last for four years — for using illegal substances, he became the villain in the piece; with Mr Bolt portrayed as the “saviour” of athletics.
Journalists and analysts painted the expected 100m meeting between Messrs Bolt and Gatlin at the World Championships as good versus bad, clean athlete versus drug cheat.
Long hailed for his ability to relax in big-race situations, it could well be that Mr Bolt had taken all of the aforementioned in stride.
Surely, though, even he would have come close to panic following his heart-stopping stumble in yesterday’s semi-final.
Mr Bolt tells us that his coach, Mr Glen Mills, and supports staff helped him to relax following the near catastrophe. But let’s not be fooled, he would have entered the Final with doubts, as never before, about his ability to execute.
It must surely have been the biggest test of Mr Bolt’s amazing career to date. Which is where the mind chips in. It was no longer primarily about technique or the ability to run. It became primarily the capacity to stay calm and focused in extreme adversity and to execute properly when it mattered most.
As it turned out, it was Mr Gatlin who lost calm and focus in the heat of battle, as Mr Bolt got it right and closed fast.
Up to now Mr Bolt has quite justifiably been acclaimed as the greatest sprinter of all time. After yesterday — arguably his greatest ever victory — he will also be hailed for the extraordinary power of his mind.