“There you go, I am the greatest”, said Bolt, who this week said the Rio Olympics would be his last. “I’m just relieved. It’s happened”. The first one (in Beijing in 2008) I was just happy, the second one (in London in 2012) was a challenge, and then to come here and do the third one is just unbelievable.
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“To play as well as we did today in that moment and that atmosphere in a gold-medal game when you’ve been thinking about this for the last four years is just, it’s a dream come true”, coach Adam Krikorian said. For me, it’s mission accomplished.
“To win an Olympic medal is special”.
He turned a close 4×100 relay race against Japan and the United States into a typical, Bolt-like runaway, helping Jamaica win the relay in 37.27. “All of them mean the world to me – it’s nine”.
For Allyson Felix, who featured in both teams, it was a golden finale to an Olympics where her early season ambitions of completing a 200m/400m double had come down to a silver medal in the 400m. That’s what I’m doing. “He’s one of the best and I don’t know what else he has to prove”.
The 23-year-old – competing in the final of the men’s 80kg taekwondo division – landed his winning kick on Great Britain’s Lutalo Muhammad with one second of their bout remaining. Be among [Muhammad] Ali and Pele. Stina Blackstenius pulled one goal back for the Swedish team, but it was not enough as the German women celebrated their first gold medal.
That’s a pretty exclusive bracket.
And to paraphrase the great philosopher Bum Phillips, if Bolt isn’t in a class by himself, it surely must not take long to call the roll.
Team USA Basketball did its part in advancing to the gold-medal game as well after a rockier start to the tournament than most fans were used to. She had been through injury, the inability to defend her 200-meter title because she didn’t qualify at the USA trials and a near disqualification in the relay heats. Bolt’s trophy case is monochrome; and it’s that golden aura of invulnerability that adds to his legend.
Victory brings down the curtain on Bolt’s Olympic career as he has already stated he will retire from the sport at the end of the World Championships in London next summer.
Nazarov’s late effort took him past Ivan Tsikhan of Belarus, who managed 77.79m, with bronze going to Poland’s Wojciech Nowicki, who threw 77.73m.
The 6-foot-5 Bolt grew up running barefoot through the green fields of Trelawny, a rustic parish hidden deep in Jamaica’s so-called Cockpit Country known for producing two things: sugar and sprinters.
It was the ninth time since 1995 that the US men have been disqualified or failed to get the baton around at an Olympics or world championships. But Bolt has surpassed them all. Jamaica won the gold medal in 37.27 seconds. That may be part of the reason he’s beloved worldwide (more so than in the US, where his Q Score is a modest 20). Well, that and he came from humble beginnings to in turn humble American sprinters.
Bolt constantly dances and strikes his To Di World pose, taken fittingly from a popular dance hall song. He broke it out again Friday night, after taking the baton roughly even with Bromell before obliterating the field down the final straight.
“I’m definitely going to miss the crowd and the energy and just the competition”, Bolt said.
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For the 34-year-old, twice banned USA sprinter Justin Gatlin, who assumed pantomime villain status here as crowds booed him when he was introduced, the evening ended unhappily. “Nine gold medals, words can’t even describe what he’s done for the sport”. And he has been the greatest ever.
