Bolt and Shoelaces

From time to time it happens that I have to redo my shoelaces while running. Sometimes it is becouase they became undone. Sometimes is it because that get to tight later on in the run. It is good to know it happens even to the best of the world. I expect that everyone has seen the images of Usain Bolt winning in Beijing and setting an new world record with his shoelaces undone!

As this picture from the Reebok Grand Prix Saturday, June 2, 2007, in New York shows this is not an incident. Bolt ran the 200meter. Check out his laces of the left shoe (again):

Tis blijkbaar toch moeilijk, vetersstrikken....

What a race!

6.69 over 100meters from stand still. It's amazing. And you could easily tell Usain Bolt just went for the gold because in his last 10 meters he was already slowing down and leaning back. It is obvious that he wants to keep some margin so he can improve his world record again in one of the well paid grand prix races were running a world record comes with a nice bonus.

No we can look forward to a interesting 200meters.

Countdown...

A few more hours and the real fire works will start in the Birdsnest stadium of Beijing: The 100m final for men where Bolt, Powell and Gay will fight over the medalls. On the BBC News site a nice report from Jamaica.
Mind you both Powell and Bolt made it to the semi final as well as a third Jamaican: Micheal Frater...

The Making of Me: Colin Jackson

Last night on BBC you could have seen the documentry "The Making of Me: Colin Jackson". The serie challenges scientists to explain what makes certain people stand out of the crowd. In this episode: What makes Colin Jackson so special making him the top athlete that he was. Unfortunately the series is not available on BBC i player.
Therefore I try to summarize it for you. First of all for those who do not know Colin Jackson. He was, on the 110meters hurdles, two time worldchampion, twice second, once third, four times european champion and once second in the Olympics (Seoul). Barcelona should have brought his Olympic triumph but in the final he hit the third, fourth and final hurdle and stumbled on almost falling over the finish line in sixth place. One year later however he set a new world record that lasted voor 13 years (the race on youtube).
This video is his world record race:

More recent achievements are on the dance floor in BBC's Strictly Come Dancing.

Now about "The Making of Me": The documentry looks at the various aspects that might explain why Colin was succesfull:

• His genetics and partly Jamaican origin: It appears the top 20 sprinters come from either the North America's or the Carabean and mainly Jamaica
• His upbringing and environment that enabled him to explore and exploit his talents to the full
• His ability to focus and concentrated under pressure before a start shutting out the public (There is a nice quote from his dancing partner telling he showed the same attitude before going on the floor in Strictly come Dancing
• His ability to deal with setbacks. A test showed negative images stimulated his part of the brains that are generally linked to pleasant images. It appears that with every negative experience he turn is into something positive.
• His muscular structure: as might be expected he has more fast fibres (I think white muscle tissue?) than slow fibres (red?) but also an unussual amount of super fast fibres (something I never heard of before) 25% in contrast to the average 2% in other athletes....

Keep an eye out if the series comes your way or will be repeated on the BBC. It is worthwile to watch.