Bolt or Blake? The 2 year duel to be the fastest man in the
world and potentially history concludes tonight and with the eyes of the world
upon them, it’s now down to see who will walk the walk tonight. Whoever you
think should win, it’s going to be something to feast your eyes on, with the possibility
that this could be the fastest 100m in history to add to the duel of the big
two.
Few would ever have
thought that Usain Bolt (left, if you ever needed any reminder) – who stunned the world in Bejing and Berlin with times of 9.69 and 9.57 respectively –
could even have a serious rival at this distance or even be beaten, but in the
last two years 22-year-old countryman and training partner Yohan Blake - current
100m world champion when Bolt false started and Jamaican 100m and 200m champion
– has taken the world by storm and served the biggest notice yet that he was
ready to run when beating beat Bolt twice at the Jamaican Olympic trials and then
clocking an impressive 9.85 in Switzerland weeks before the Games. A facile
10.00 win in his heats – underpinned by an extremely impressive start – has given
more encouragement to those who believe that he is the man to beat Bolt once
again, along with market support that has seen him cut into a best of just 7/4
to be crowned Olympic champion.
Bolt clearly wasn’t at his best in Kingston when beaten by
Blake twice – he started extremely badly, and in the aftermath he admitted that
he was only 95% fit – and he had been suffering injury and fatigue troubles
(Bolt, suffers from scoliosis, a condition in which the spine is curved from
side to side, was understood to have been suffering with niggling leg and back
problems) earlier in the season, going in only 10.04, although he backed that
up when the second-fastest 100m of the year, 9.76s, at the Rome Diamond League.
Infact Bolt has posted three of the five fastest times in the world this season
so far, and for all the doubts surrounding him, it should be noted that we know
he has the potential to go to 9.58 at his very best.
Bolt hasn’t raced since then barring yesterday’s heats,
which posts more doubts for some that he might not be able to show his best
today, but the way he jogged to 10.09 suggests he should be ready to run for
his life and the main concern would be over his start. If forced to pock
between the two Bolt – in the knowledge that he can go to world record pace and
then even faster if needs be – would get the vote, but it’s too close to call
and the value has gone from both of them for me.
The real value may be in a dutch of the winning times.
Backing 9.51-9.60 and 9.61-9.69 on a track that’s playing this fast seems to have
little or no downside to it, with this being one of the fastest crops of all.
Barring Bolt and Blake, five other sprinters have run sub-9.90 times this
season in Justin Gatlin, Asafa Powell, Keston Bledman, Ryan Bailey and Tyson
Gay, leading many to believe that the track is one of the fastest used. Skybet
go 2/1 on all of the Athletes passing the finish line in under 10 seconds, and
that’s hard to argue with although too short now from the 11/4 offered pre games.
The 1 Million pound track features technology that aims to
rebound energy from the sideways movement of athletes' feet, including little
toes and the side of the foot, which makes it a faster surface than the one in
Bejing, which was designed to maximise the rebound when runners pushed forward
and backwards, losing energy laterally according to experts.
Gatlin did 9.97, the fastest time in Olympic history for
that stage of the competition, and then in the next heat heat the American's
team-mate, Bailey, went faster, winning his heat in a personal best of 9.88 –
the joint-10th fastest time in the world this season. Only the previous day
there were 15 personal bests in the women's heptathlon hurdles while in the
first round of the women's 100m six women ran sub-11 second times. Coral go 8/11 that the Olympic record of 9.69
held by Bolt is broken, and that may be the one of the bets of the games. *
The race for third is one of the most fascinating aspects of
the whole race. Before the events had started I was extremely sure of Tyson Gay
being the best of the rest by a long way, although Justin Gatlin’s impressive
time in the heats as well as the US Trials makes this a more than open affair
with Asafa Powell there in the mix as well. It should be remembered that Gay is
the second fastest man in history, although the proviso is that he’s not been
quite the same since injury in 2009. That said, he’s one of just 3 men to have
beaten Bolt in history. A controlled race of 10.08 into a considerable headwind
was also impressive, and while he has no medals in a major championship final
since 2009, he’s as talented as any.
Justin Gatlin (9.97 in heats) beat Gay at the US Olympic
trials and has an Olympic and world 100m title, although his PB doesn’t have a
hope of matching Gay’s. Both are 9/4 to win without Bolt and Blake, which is
worthy of serious consideration. The temptation is to go for Gay, although
Gatlin’s lurking enough to worry us out of putting serious welly behind the bet.
A Bolt-Blake-Gay tricast is 9/2 with Paddy Power and a better way to put our
money where our mouth is.
Nobody has run more sub-10 second 100m races than anyone
else in history than Asafra Powell but the Jamaican could only manage a
fifth-place finish at the 2004 and 2008 Games, and his best at these fames is a
Bronze, with makes it hard to get behind him with real enthusiasm. Ryan Bailey ran the fastest time by a conservable
distance yesterday but he had a strong following wind behind him and he was
giving far more than anyone of the main contenders did yesterday.
Advice
6 pts New Olympic record (8/11 Coral)
1 pt winning time to be between 9.51-9.60 secs (3/1 general)
1 pt winning time to be between 9.61-9.70 secs (2/1 general)
1 pt Bolt/Blake/Gay (9/2 Paddy Power)
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