Besides remarkable athleticism and God given talent, what are some of Bolt's amazing success secrets?
Bolt bucks convention. At 6ft 5in, he should be too tall to be a sprinter. “People think you have to be short, strong and stocky to be a great sprinter and Usain Bolt has defied that,” said Richard Thompson, Bolt's runner-up in the 100m Olympics. “It's the beginning of something else.”
Coach Glen Mills, who in recent years transformed Bolt from a teen prodigy into a sprint sensation on the elite stage, gave insight into the technical adjustments that led to his Olympic dominance. "Our emphasis was to get him as technically correct as possible and that took us over two seasons. Last year, we concentrated on correcting his running the bend, making him more efficient around the curve. I felt that I could significantly improve his 200 meters. He was leaning inside on the turn and was unbalanced. We got him to lean forward and that contributed to him developing a good first 100 meters."
Bolt admits to making a huge turnaround under the guidance of his coach, Glen Mills. "Things changed dramatically when I joined up with Glen," he said. "Glen is like a father figure to me... He is a guiding light in my career and he has shown me the way to improve myself both as a person and as an athlete."
When asked about Carl Lewis his predecessor who won the 100 and 200 meter races in the Olympics, Bolt replied: "I don't think about it too much as that puts too much pressure on you. Like a baby, I'm taking a step at a time."
Instead of being nervous and uptight as athletes are supposed to be, Bolt is the picture perfect of relaxation. Before each of his magnificent performances on the track, he finds time to express a laidback exuberance that defies the norm. Audiences are accustomed to the somber aspect of the nervous athlete, whose life seems in the balance. Instead, here comes a young man, who says and shows that running is not a matter of life and death. It is only a sport. It is just another experience to be shared, a platform on which to delight and amaze.
The day after Bolt's 100m Olympic win, IOC boss Rogge told reporters, "I have no problem with him doing a show. However, I think he should show more respect for his competitors and shake hands, give a tap on the shoulder to the other ones immediately after the finish and not make gestures like the one he made in the 100 meters."
Singaporean businessman James Tan, 68, who was at the Bird's Nest Stadium when Bolt rewrote the 100m record, said the Bolt he saw was definitely not disrespectful. 'He hammed it up for the cameras, he went into the stands to hug people, he danced for us - and he made sure he covered the entire stadium. Everyone loved him,' said Tan. 'He also bowed to the crowd. Would someone who is disrespectful do that?'
The editor of the Jamaica Observer explained Bolt's behavior in terms of the local culture: “It's the face of Jamaica we like to sell our tourists, whom we greet with song, dance and unbridled joy as opposed to a stiff upper lip, meaningless small talk and other diplomatic gestures of insincerity. As our own reggae icon Mr Bob Marley pointed out so many years ago in song, ‘We refuse to be what they wanted us to be. We are what we are, that's the way it's going to be.'”
According to team doctor Elliott, part of Bolt's record beating performance is religious conviction.
Elliott used the movie ‘Chariots of Fire', based on two British athletes competing in the 1924 Olympics, as an illustration. “You remember the guy who believed in God so strongly? Our athletes are strong believers in the Almighty. They believe that without the Almighty they can do nothing, and with the Almighty they actually can do anything.”
The secret of Usain Bolt's sprinting prowess, at least according to his Aunt Lilly, lies in a substance the precocious Olympic champion has consumed for years: the mouth-watering yellow yams she still cooks for him at Miss Lilly's Bar and Shop, deep in the hilly heartland of Jamaica. "You can count on that," Lilly Bolt, 56, told Time by telephone from the patio of her restaurant, where Usain also likes to dance to roots reggae music. And Bolt's performance-enhancing yams should not be confused with any kind of drug: "I don't even use fertilizer growing those yams," she says.
A growing number of Jamaican citizens and officials are counting on their world-conquering young sprinter - who has never failed a drug test, and often speaks out against the gunplay at home - to supplant self-styled "roughneck" singers as role models, and help reduce the country's horrific levels of violent crime.
"Bolt can speak to the young people in our more troubled communities, especially since he comes from those communities," says Jamaican sports writer Carole Beckford, author of Keeping Jamaica's Sport on Track.
Bolt's Aunt Lilly agrees: "This gives Jamaicans a new picture to hold in their hands and look at for a moment and say to themselves, you know, we can do better."
The most controversial explanation of Bolt's gold run comes from his team doctor, Herb Elliott. Elliott, who oversees drug testing in Jamaica, said African slaves who ended up in Jamaica were among the strongest and most determined - qualities, he says, that have helped Usain Bolt and his team mates.
“They say that our aggression, our toughness, came out of our slave situation,” said Elliott, who is black. The team doctor said he subscribes to the view “considering that Jamaica had more slavery rebellion than any country in the world.”
The background, Elliott suggested, involves what is known as the Middle Passage, the second stage of the transatlantic slave trade. Ships carried enslaved Africans to the Caribbean islands in North and South America in the late 1700s and early 1800s. The slaves who staged frequent rebellions in Jamaica, Elliott said, have created a culture of resolve that led to success in sprinting and academics. “We passed exams at universities abroad because of the strength where other blacks failed,” he said.
Maybe we can take of leaf from The Bolt Supremacy to build a generation of South African role-model athletes - young men and women that will show the world exactly what we are capable of and why Madiba has repeatedly called Mzansi a Nation of Champions.
