Headliner: Tyson Gay Steals the Show
I think we can all admit it now. We didn't quite see that coming. In the biggest upset of the season, Tyson Gay shot out of the blocks in front of Usain Bolt, and then easily dispatched him in Bolt's usually dominant portion of the race: from 40 meters-80 meters. Bolt uncharacteristically, appeared to be straining and frantically trying to make up the early gap. The gregarious Jamaican's face was tensed up, his movement looked choppy, and he was gaining nothing on Tyson Gay.
From the outset of the race, his drive phase and his transition to an upright full sprint looked slow and unnatural. When Usain ran 9.58 running wire-to-wire for the win, he looked easy and smooth throughout. When he ran 9.97 yesterday having to come back against Gay, he looked forced and sloppy. Bolt admitted after the race that he is not working as hard as he should be and his strength is sub-par at the moment. Gay, humble and thoughtful as always, downplayed the victory saying, essentially, he has not seen the best nor the last of Bolt.
The result confirmed my belief that the oftentimes seemingly unbeatable Bolt can be beaten, even in a championship stage, if three things transpire:
1) Bolt is dinged up or distracted with a variety of things keeping him from optimal training on the track. This is less unlikely than one might think- he is constantly hounded by the Press, has had some injury concerns, and enjoys the party scene and being a global icon
2) Bolt gets off to a poor start and has to recover- Bolt has a wide comfort zone in which he follows his coaching perfectly and executes his race, a poor start threatens to push him to straining and breaking from the fluidity that made him the fastest man alive and the surest thing since a commercial break in the middle of that 5K
3) A healthy Tyson Gay pulls off his best start, and runs to his potential. We often forget that Tyson has run 9.71 and 9.69 when he was dinged up! Bolt has beaten those times only twice in his career. Of course, those times are easy to remember- theBeijing final and the Berlin Final.
Huge stages, huge performances, huge aura, and huge charisma. There is a reason an upset of Bolt led Sportscenter. The point is, though, Tyson Gay has not had everything come together perfectly like Bolt did last year in Berlin or Beijing. He's dealt with injuries almost constantly. Maybe that's just who he is, but if he can nurse that balky hamstring and come into Daegu or London without concerns, why can't he run 9.6x? He was .13 behind an all-out Bolt when he was hurt enough to skip the 200. That just shows his natural talent and competitive spirit. The talent's there, the work ethic's there, and if the the health and the start's there....well Usain may find himself straining again after the first 30 meters. As this will be discussed ad nauseum, I'm going to devote my next post to the rest of the meet.
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