Mind-boggling.
What a terrific term. Makes you smile just to say it.
In the sports world, we seldom encounter true mind-bogglers – feats stupendous enough to flummox you worse than Paris Hilton holding a paper that reads “turn over” on both sides.
At the Beijing Olympics, we encountered one such diamond in the rough: the number 9.69.
As in 9.69 seconds, or the time it took Jamaica’s Usain Bolt to run the 100-meter dash.
Nine-point-six-nine. Turned that sucker over in my head a million times (felt just like Paris). Nine-point-six-effing-nine!
Do you realize how fast that is?
For perspective, 100 meters equates to 328 feet, 1 inch. So on average, Mr. “Lightning” Bolt covered 33 feet, 10 inches every second of the race.
Look at a spot about 30 feet away from you, and imagine being able to get there in a single second. That’s so fast it makes Barry Sanders look like Barry White.
Yet Bolt actually slowed down at the end of the race. Dragged his feet, threw out his arms in celebration and still became the first man to run the hundred in less than 9.7 seconds.
Consider my mind thoroughly boggled.
But 9.69 was merely the first world record Bolt set in Beijing (breaking his own mark, of 9.72 seconds). He followed up his 100-meter insanity with an equally ridiculous run in the 200 meters.
Bolt crossed the finish in 19.30 seconds, breaking Michael Johnson’s world record from the 1996 Atlanta Games by 0.02 seconds. You probably remember when Johnson set that record; people deemed it unbreakable.
Bolt broke it while running into the wind, this time without letting up at the end. Nobody else in the race fared the slightest chance of beating him; it was Bolt versus Johnson all the way. And as he surpassed the first man to win the 200m and 400m at the same Olympics, Bolt also became the first to sweep the 100m and 200m since Carl Lewis – and Bolt alone won both events in world record time.
Then, in the 4×100 meter relay, Bolt earned another gold medal. He ran the race’s third leg faster than an electrical current and, along with his fleet-footed Jamaican teammates, obliterated the field en route to another world record finish of 37.10 seconds (0.30 seconds faster than the U.S. team in 1993).
Oh, and Usain Bolt turned 22 in Beijing. Makes a certain 21-year-old feel like, well, an underachiever.
But IOC President Jacques Rogge lambasted Bolt for over-celebrating and not congratulating his competitors. Rogge said, “That’s not the way we perceive being a champion,” in response to Bolt’s claiming “I am No. 1” and his catch-me-if-you-can attitude.
There’s something to be said for that. Upon reviewing Bolt’s races, the Jamaican jackrabbit certainly could have acted more sportsmanlike. After Johnson set his 200-meter world record, he hugged the other racers in appreciation.
But in this age of egocentric superstars, sportsmanship often goes by the wayside whether we like it or not.
And you know what? Bolt is No. 1. Catch him? They couldn’t. No matter how Rogge perceives a champion, he cannot deny that Bolt indeed is one.
So let’s put “Lightning” Bolt’s performance into context:
Sprinting must have been one of humanity’s earliest forms of competition. Some dude probably turned to another dude and said, “Hey, see that spot over there? Bet I can get there before you.” So easy a caveman could do it.
That said, we have no knowledge of anyone, ever, being better at getting to a spot 100 meters or 200 meters away than Usain Bolt.
You know the aphorism “There’s always a bigger fish?” Well, right now, in the ocean of sprinting – one of the oldest oceans in the world of athletic competition – Bolt is the Kraken, Moby Dick and Leviathan rolled into one. There has never been a bigger fish.
Mind-boggling.
Contact Sam Rosenthal at samrose24@gmail.com
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