RIO DE JANEIRO – Usain Bolt sauntered onto the track, stretched out his arms and waved his hands, signaling for more applause.
He knew how this night was going to go.
Bolt’s swan song in the Olympic 100 meters Sunday night was a no-doubter – a pedestrian-by-his-standards 9.81-second sprint down the straightaway, but not so slow that he couldn’t take time to point at his own chest with his thumb a step before he crossed the finish line.
“It was brilliant,” Bolt said. “I didn’t go so fast but I’m so happy I won. I told you guys I was going to do it.”
He won his record-setting third straight title in track’s featured event and his seventh Olympic gold.
He has already swept aside pretty much every sprinter who had any claim on being the greatest.
So, on a muggy night in Rio, Bolt took aim at Michael Phelps, shoving the swimmer and all his 23 medals to the background and made it official: The Bolt Games have begun.
Bolt beat American Justin Gatlin, who was greeted by the fans with raucous boos, by .08 seconds. Andre de Grasse of Canada won the bronze.
Bolt has a chance for two more golds – in his favorite race, the 200 final Thursday, then in the 4×100 relay Saturday night.
He wasn’t the only one to put on a show Sunday.
A few minutes before his race, world champion Wayde van Niekerk of South Africa eclipsed what many thought was the most-unbreakable record in the book – Michael Johnson’s 17-year-old mark of 43.18 seconds in 400 meters.
Running out of Lane 8, where the lag puts him well in front of the rest of the field, van Niekerk never saw a soul – crossing in 43.03 and only glancing to his left when he approached the line to peer at the clock, which showed him what he had done.
“Usain Bolt will be retiring soon, but this could be the next star of the sport,” Johnson said during his commentary on BBC.
The current star? That guy named Bolt.
The 6-foot-5 sprinter/celebrity overcame his typically slow unfurling from the blocks – he was second-to-last after the break – then churned his legs to gradually build up speed. He caught Gatlin with about 40 meters left and the rest was a matter of how hard he wanted to run.
Gatlin pursued him gamely, the way he has for years. He finished with silver again and, while Bolt was celebrating with anyone he could find, Gatlin was parading the American flag around the track virtually alone. The boos from the Brazilian crowd were the latest ugly chapter in Gatlin’s saga. He’s been caught for doping twice. His last ban ended in 2010. But fans in the stadium bought into the “Good vs. Evil” story line that’s been pitched by the media for all these years, and they let the American have it.
“That’s the first time I’ve gone into a stadium and they’ve started to boo,” Bolt said. “It surprised me.”
A split-second after he crossed, Bolt raised the index finger, and then, the real party began.
Bolt unlaced his now-famous gold spikes and took selfies with the fans. He turned his yellow hat backward, kneeled down and gave the crowd what it really wanted – that famous, arching, “To the World” pose that he debuted eight years ago in Beijing.
Chants of “Bolt, Bolt, Bolt” rang out from the near-capacity stadium. Yes, the show lived up to its billing.
But this was not Bolt at his fastest. Four years ago, all three medalists broke 9.8. Nobody did this time, and neither Bolt’s world record from 2009 (9.58) nor his Olympic record from London (9.63) were ever in jeopardy.
It was not Bolt at his toughest. Some might argue his gutsy effort at last year’s world championships, when he overcame a season’s worth of injuries to beat Gatlin by .01, might have been the grittiest race he has won.
But it certainly took hard work. Before the Olympics, Bolt hadn’t run a 100 since June 30, when he pulled out of Jamaica’s national championships with injuries to his left hamstring.
The rehab started immediately, with trips to Germany to see his doctor, then a warm-up 200 in London to prove to his Olympic committee that he was fit for the Olympics. Shortly after he arrived in Rio, he conceded that, yes, he wished he’d had more chances to run in real races, but that everything would be okay.
It was more than that. From the moments before he crouched into the blocks, putting his finger to his lips and asking for silence, until long after the race, when he worked the crowd, posed for photos, made the troubled world of track feel fun again.
He turns 30 the day of the closing ceremony and has insisted his Olympic days are over.
“Somebody said I can become immortal,” Bolt said. “Two more medals to go and I can sign off. Immortal.”
Elsewhere in Rio, Justin Rose won the first golfing gold medal at the Olympics in 112 years, beating Henrik Stenson by two strokes, and Simone Biles added a third gold in gymnastics, capturing the women’s vault title.
As Rose’s birdie putt on the 18th green fell into the cup, the 36-year-old thrust his fist into the air and popped the British crest on his shirt before embracing Stenson.
Klay Thompson ended an Olympic-long slump with 30 points, and the U.S. needed almost all of them to hold off France, 100-97, in basketball. It was the third straight close call for the favorites, who are looking as beatable as ever under Coach Mike Krzyzewski.
Second-seeded Andy Murray of Britain beat Juan Martin del Potro of Argentina for his second consecutive Olympic singles tennis gold medal. His 7-5, 4-6, 6-2, 7-5 victory halted the resurgent run of the 141st-ranked del Potro, who knocked off No. 1 Novak Djokovic in the first round and No. 3 Rafael Nadal in the semifinals.
In the latest security incident to hit South America’s first Olympic Games, Ryan Lochte and three other American swimmers were robbed at gunpoint early Sunday by thieves posing as police officers who pulled over their taxi and took cash and credit cards.
Among many other embarrassments are empty seats, long lines and green water in some of the Olympic pools.
Synchronized swimmers were greeted Sunday by clear blue water in the pool after officials worked through the night to replace the murky green water that prompted competitors to dub it “The Swamp.”
Americans Bethanie Mattek-Sands and Jack Sock won the Olympic tennis title in mixed doubles, denying Venus Williams a record fifth gold medal.
Other highlights from Day 9:
Jemima Jelagat Sumgong had to evade a protester on her way to delivering Kenya’s first gold in Rio, one which may have been saved by the swift intervention of security forces with a kilometer to go in the women’s marathon. A man leapt over the railings waving a sign and two police motor bikes instantly cut him off.
Brazil’s men’s soccer team, led by superstar Neymar, has arrived in Rio de Janeiro. Brazil played in Brasilia, Salvador and Sao Paulo. Soccer is the only competition that is played outside of the Olympic host city. Seeking its first soccer gold medal, Brazil plays Honduras in the semifinals Wednesday at the Maracana Stadium.
Shinobu Ota of Japan stunned seven-time Greco-Roman world champion and 2012 Olympic gold medalist Hamid Soryan of Iran 5-4. The world’s oldest sport has undergone major changes. Matches now feature two 3-minute periods with cumulative scoring instead of the best-of-three format that could be a snooze.
While worries about water pollution marked the run-up to the Rio Games, it was really the whipping wind that stirred up trouble during Olympic rowing. For the first time since 1996, the Olympic regatta was not held in a purpose-built lake, but a natural lagoon that left rowers exposed to the elements in new ways.
Kei Nishikori gave Japan its first Olympic tennis medal in 86 years, overcoming a mid-match lull to beat 2008 champion Rafael Nadal for the bronze in men’s singles. Nishikori won the third-place match 6-2, 6-7 (1), 6-3 after blowing a 5-2 lead in the second set. Nadal leaves Brazil with a gold medal from men’s doubles for Spain.
Max Whitlock delivered Britain’s first gold medal in gymnastics – but he wasn’t able to savor the moment. He had to quickly turn his attention from the floor exercise to the pommel horse competition. He won gold there, too.