Bolt delivers for troubled sport

Usain Bolt had just completed his press conference after winning 200 metres gold at the London Olympics, his second title of the Games, and had risen from his seat when he paused for a moment before deciding he had one last message to impart.

“I am now a living legend. Bask in my glory,” he proclaimed.

And we did.

From any other sportsman such a statement would have reeked of unbearable arrogance, but from the Jamaican it did anything but.

He is, after all, a six-time Olympic champion, five-time world champion and multiple world record holder; he is the only man to have successfully defended Olympic 100 and 200 metres titles; he has run more than a tenth of a second faster than anyone else in history. Three more gold medals, including in the relay, will surely follow at the upcoming World Championships in Moscow.

That might be more than enough to warrant adulation the world over.

But Bolt, crucially, has something extra – a winning personality to match the winning times.

Who else could you imagine entering the Olympic Stadium riding on the back of a missile, shades on, Jamaican flag waving, saluting the crowd as he half danced, half waved on his pre-competition lap of honour at last weekend’s Sainsbury’s Anniversary Games.

He is part athlete, part rock star.

He said ahead of his appearance in London he was “made to inspire”. It is hard to argue.

While he does not take himself too seriously, he treats his sport with all the all seriousness it demands.

And that is plenty, given it is one which has just lurched into another doping crisis, adding credence to the cynics’ claims that you cannot tell who is clean and who is dirty.

And at a time when the sport needs him most, Bolt fronts up.

A fortnight ago women sprinters Shelly-Ann Fraser-Pryce and Carmelita Jeter walked out of a press conference when asked about the failed drug tests by Asafa Powell and Tyson Gay, which have shaken athletics to its core.

Bolt got the same treatment when he faced journalists a week later.

He was met with a barrage of questions on doping, even forced to justify his own achievements, and did not duck the issue. He answered each and every one with calm assurance.

To a large extent the 26-year-old carries the sport, now so more than ever, and he respects the responsibilities that come with that burden.

“I can’t determine how much the sport needs me, I think other people determine that,” he said.

“I am just here to do my best and to prove to the world that it is possible to run clean and train hard and be focused.”

There is no doubt about it, though. It is out on the track at the major championships where he is at his best.

But the sad thing is this year he does not need to be.

He ran his fastest 100m of the year at the Olympic Stadium last Friday, recovering from a start he described as “horrifying” to win in 9.85 seconds.

His 100m world record of 9.58secs and his 200m mark of 19.19s are now four years old.

He will still, though, be the fastest man in Moscow. He is ranked number one over 200m and number two behind Gay over 100m.

Bolt said: “I never try to worry about times, I’m in great shape. I’m just going out there to run, that’s what I do. I always do well at championships.”

Neither Gay nor Powell will be in Moscow as they wait for their doping saga to run its course, while Bolt’s training partner Yohan Blake, the Olympic 100m and 200m silver medallist known as ’The Beast’, will be missing through injury.

Instead, it looks like drug cheat Justin Gatlin will be Bolt’s main rival over the 100m – he beat the Jamaican in Rome earlier in the season – while the 200m should be a stroll.

Bolt does have a score to settle from the World Championships in Daegu two years ago when he false started in the 100m final and was disqualified. Blake won in his absence.

The safe money will be on it being well and truly settled this summer.