Jamaica's Usain Bolt gestures to the crowd after winning the men's 100m final during the London 2012 Olympic Games at the Olympic Stadium. (Photo : Reuters)
It will take another three days to see if Jamaican sprinter Usain Bolt can earn another gold medal at the London 2012 Summer Olympics.
For today, however, Jamaicans around the world are celebrating not just their 50th year of independence from the British, but knowing two of their athletes won the top prizes at the 100-meter race, ironically, on British soil.
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Bolt successfully defended his 100-meter Olympic title from the 2008 Beijing Summer Olympics on Sunday, despite stiff competition from Team USA's Tyson Gay and Justin Gatlin, but more importantly the man most people predicted would win the race, fellow Jamaican Yohan Blake.
Blake, the 2011 100-meter world champion, was expected to defeat his fellow Jamaican after Bolt suffered an injury, was disqualified at the 2011 world championship due to an early start, and losing at the Jamaican Olympic trials. American Olympic gold medalist Maurice Greene was one of those that predict the race to favor Blake.
"Blake is just a little bit better and if you go back and look at the Jamaican trials they say Bolt had a bad start but look at Blake too he was right back there with Bolt, they both had bad starts and Blake was still able to come out victorious in that race. I mean even though he is having slow starts he still gets second though so he is still able to overcome some things," said Greene, a former world 100-meter record holder.
"At the trials, when Yohan Blake beat me, twice, it woke me up, opened my eyes," said Bolt, according to the Associated Press. "It was like he come, knocked on my door and say, 'It's an Olympic year, are you ready?' I just really refocused and got everything together and came back ready."
Bolt shut down the critics by winning the 100-meter in Olympic record time of 9.63 seconds, winning his first gold medal at the London Olympics. Blake would perform a personal best of 9.75 seconds, winning the silver medal. Gatlin would win the bronze.
Bolt's next race is on Tues., Aug. 7, at 6:50 a.m. EDT. It won't be for a gold medal, but it's the first round for the men's 200-meter race. Bolt's heat in round one will feature Team USA's Isiah Young. Blake will be featured in the fourth heat of round one. The gold medal race for the 200-meter race will be Thurs., Aug. 9 at 3:55 EDT.
The race will be streamed live on NBCOlympics.com
Usain Bolt's Olympic Track & Field Schedule:
200-Meter
Men's 200-meter Round 1: August 7, 6:50 a.m. EDT
Men's 200-meter Semifinals: August 8, 3:10 p.m. EDT
Men's 200-meter Final: August 9, 3:55 p.m. EDT
4x100-Meter Relay
Men's 4x100-meter Relay Round 1: - August 10, 2:45 p.m. EDT
Men's 4x100-meter Relay Final: - August 11, 4 p.m. EDT
The London 2012 Summer Olympics can be seen on the networks of NBC Universal.
