The Honourable Usain St. Leo Bolt,
OJ,
C.D. (pronounced
/ˈjuːseɪn/;
[8] born 21 August 1986), is a
Jamaican sprinter and a five-time World and three-time Olympic
gold medalist. He is the
world record and
Olympic record holder in the
100 metres, the
200 metres and (along with his teammates) the
4×100 metres relay. He is the reigning Olympic champion in these three events.
Bolt won a 200 m gold medal at the
2002 World Junior Championships, making him the competition's youngest-ever gold medalist. In 2004, at the
CARIFTA Games, he became the first junior sprinter to run the 200 m in under 20 seconds with a time of 19.93 s,
[9] breaking the previous
world junior record held by
Roy Martin by two-tenths of a second. He turned professional in 2004, and although he competed at the
2004 Summer Olympics, he missed most of the next two seasons due to injuries. In 2007, he broke
Don Quarrie's 200 m
Jamaican record with a run of 19.75 s.
His 2008 season began with his first
world record performance—a
100 m world record of 9.72 s—and culminated in world and
Olympic records in both the 100 m and 200 m events at the
2008 Beijing Summer Olympics. He ran 9.69 s for the 100 m and 19.30 s in the 200 m, and also set a 4×100 m relay record of 37.10 s with the Jamaican team. This made him the first man to win three sprinting events at a single Olympics since
Carl Lewis in 1984, and the first man to set world records in all three at a single Olympics. The following year he further lowered his own 100 m and 200 m world records to 9.58 s and 19.19 s respectively at the
2009 World Championships.
[10] This made him the first man to hold both the 100 and 200 m world and Olympic titles at the same time.
His 2009 record breaking margin over 100 m is the highest since the start of digital time measurements.
[11] His achievements in sprinting have earned him the media nickname "Lightning Bolt",
[12] and awards including the
IAAF World Athlete of the Year,
Track & Field Athlete of the Year, and
Laureus Sportsman of the Year.
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