My focus is not to get injured: Usain Bolt

Moscow, Aug 18 (IANS)

Usain Bolt of Jamaica celebrates winning the gold medal in the Men’s 200 metres final during Day Eight of the 14th IAAF World Athletics Championships Moscow 2013 at Luzhniki Stadium on August 17, 2013 in Moscow, Russia. (Photo by Mark Kolbe/Getty Images)

World record-holder Usain bolt has said his focus was not only on winning medals but also on avoiding injuries in preparations for the 2016 Olympics.

The Jamaican sprinter completed his 200m world title hat-trick as he took an easy win with a world leading time of 19.66 seconds at the 2013 IAAF World Championships here Saturday, reports Xinhua.

The lead was so overwhelming for the Jamaican that he even did not need to dash to his fastest in the last 10 metres.

Asked by a reporter in the press conference following the race why he slowed down in the last few metres, Bolt admitted he “wasn’t too stressful” in the last 50 metres as he checked his left, and found “there no one there”.

Though always trying to run as fast as possible, Bolt said he got tired easily after years of running. Thus, it is a challenge to balance between medals and muscles, he noted.

When running fast for titles, the worst thing that could happen to a sprinter is to get injured; when he slows down, others will catch him up, the 26-year-old noted, adding that he eyes the 2016 Olympics and the focus of his next season is “not to get injured”.

For the same reason, he scrapped the long jump plan after careful consultations with his coach. “I’ve talked about long jump with my coach. I was planning that I would try it either this season or next season but we decided that I’m not going to do long jump,” he said.

“I don’t want to get knee problems or any injury because one of my biggest goals is to go to the Olympics in Rio (de Janeiro in 2016) and dominate and try to regain my titles, so I have to be focused and I can’t mess around and get injured by doing long jump.”

After winning Olympic double-triple of 100m, 200m and 4x100m relay gold in Beijing and London, Bolt made it clear he didn’t want to be merely a flash of lightning but a long-lasting shinning star.

On his way to the 2016 Games, Bolt vowed to be “continuing to pile on the gold medals as much as I can, trying to stay undefeated in the championships”.

Bolt bettered his own world leading time of 19.73 set in Paris early last month, although his winning time of 19.66 was well shy of his 19.19secs world record set at the Berlin World Championships four years ago.