Sorry farewell: Bolt ‘kept apologising’ to team-mates
Usain Bolt’s Jamaican team-mates have revealed the track and field great ‘‘kept apologising to us’’ after his dramatic collapse in the world championships 4x100m relay final in London.
The 30-year-old had taken the baton for Jamaica a few metres adrift of the two leaders when, straining hard to catch them, he stopped abruptly with cramp in his left hamstring, began hobbling and tumbled to a halt after a forward roll.
As Britain went on to win gold, Bolt lay on his back in his lane, his head in hands, being tended to by medics as one waited with a wheelchair to help push him off the track.
Bolt’s team-mates insisted there was no need for an apology and Yohan Blake was angry that the relay teams were made to wait in cold conditions for 40 minutes due to two medal ceremonies.
The sport’s greatest entertainer was determined that one of the finest careers in sport was not going to end with him in a wheelchair.
So the fastest man of all-time, surrounded by his three worried team mates, Omar McLeod, Julian
Forte and Yohan Blake, rose gingerly to his feet and limped the last 30 metres to the line.
The official result recorded that the Jamaicans did not finish but Bolt had been determined to ensure he completed the last race after a matchless career in which he won 19 major championship gold medals.
Bolt’s only thoughts were with the team-mates he felt he had let
down. ‘‘He kept apologising to us but we told him there was no need to apologise,’’ Forte said. ‘‘Injuries are part of the sport.’’
McLeod added: ‘‘It just happened – Usain Bolt’s name will always live on.’’
Justin Gatlin, the American winner of the individual 100m who had consigned Bolt to third place in his final individual race last weekend, paid tribute to his rival.
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