Van Niekerk set the Games alight on Sunday night (Monday morning, SA time) when he smashed Michael Johnson’s 17-year-old world record to run 43.03 in the 400m final.
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Van Nierkerk is the son of Odessa Swarts, a champion South African sprinter who would not participate on the world stage since South Africa was banned from all sports.
“I was over there for about two weeks training”, Van Niekerk said. “I just did my best tonight”.
Having dominated the sprinting world for nearly a decade, Usain Bolt has offered the tantalising prospect of bowing out from global competition with a showdown against new 400-metres world record holder Wayde van Niekerk, suggesting he would be keen to race the South African over 300m.
“He is so young, what else can he do?”
Johnson also said he once thought he could go under 43 seconds, but never did he.
“I’ve never seen anything like that from 200m to 400m”, said Johnson.
With Usain Bolt, who’s openly Manchester United, retiring after Rio, it’ll be nice that athletics’ next superstar supports us instead of our rivals. Wayde van Niekerk broke 400m world record with an incredible effort that actually looked like child’s play to the spectators.
“I’m happy to be part of a race that made history”, said James. James finished in 43.76, just 0.02 away from his best, while Merritt came home in 43.85. Now I’ve got the world record and Liverpool beat Arsenal.
Van Niekerk would be equally excited that the captain of Liverpool, Jordan Henderson hailed him on Instagram. “I’m grateful I could trust in her work, and I think it speaks for itself”. “He ran his heart out”. You’ve got to run from the start to run 43.0. “To me, I wasn’t really surprised he got it”.
Earlier this year, Van Niekerk spent time in Jamaica working with Bolt’s coach, Glen Mills.
Asked what his race strategy was, van Niekerk said he didn’t know and laughed. It might not be the most conventional of athlete-coach partnerships, but according to the runner, Botha has played a massive part in propelling him to the pinnacle of global athletics.
Van Niekerk was on board too. “Hopefully I can inspire other South Africans and athletes around the world to go out and do their thing”.
And she is not going anywhere just yet.
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“I believe in myself as an athlete and I believe in my abilities”, he added. In his own words: “the sky’s the limit”.
