Time to set new 200 record – Bolt

JAMAICAN sprint star Usain Bolt has set his sights on breaking his own 200-metre world record in 2014 with no competitions to distract his focus.

Bolt, who was last week named IAAF male World Athlete of the Year for a fifth time, captured yet another triple-gold haul at the world championships in Moscow this year, defending his 100m and 200m titles before anchoring the Jamaican team to victory in the 4x100 relay.

But records were off the agenda for Bolt this year despite claiming the world-leading 200 time in Moscow – a situation the 27-yearold is keen to rectify as he plans his strategy for 2014.

“Definitely for this season me and my coach have decided to focus on running faster because there is no championship, so we are definitely targeting the 200 metres,” Bolt said during a visit to Tokyo’s Olympic Stadium yesterday.

“We’ll see what happens. Hopefully I can stay injury-free and everything will go well this season and I can break the world record.”

Bolt set the current 200 world mark of 19.19 sec and the 100 record of 9.58 sec at the world championships in Berlin in 2009.

“It’s all about not getting injured this season,” said Bolt. “That’s my focus, and then we’re going to try to push... and hopefully get the world record and it will all work out.

“We’re going to to run a lot more 200 this season and we’ll see if we can get it done.”

Six-time Olympic gold-medal winner Bolt earlier this year indicated that the 2016 Rio Games would be the swansong to his glittering career at the age of 30, before hinting in September that he could carry on for another year.

But Bolt revealed yesterday that his coach believes he is capable of continuing until the Tokyo Olympics in 2020, even if the athlete himself does not share his enthusiasm. – Sapa-AFP