By Audley Boyd, Assistant Sport Editor SCREEECH! IT'S scratched. Time for the switch... and a new start.
SPRINT phenomenon Usain Bolt is just about getting in the blocks again, preparing to get the real portion of his track career up and running.
The former William Knibb star, who lowered the World Junior Record for 200 metres at age 17, is under orders from a new starter, the national senior team's track and field head coach since taking to baton from the legendary Herb McKenley in 1987, Glen Mills - one of the best in the sprint business.
Mills has been to every Olympics since 1984 when he was McKenley's assistant. He is the man responsible for Camperdown High's Champs team earning the nickname 'Sprint Factory' as it churned out a battery of fast men including Raymond Stewart and Leroy Reid, who went on to rank as Jamaica's finest.
INCREDIBLE SPEED
There is no doubt Bolt has the potential to be one of Jamaica's finest. Even Mills attests to that. What he also points out that the young man, dubbed 'Lightning Bolt' due to his incredible speed, needs to fulfil that great expectation.
After hitting a high at the regional CARIFTA Games in Barbados last year when he set the WJR; and running an eye-opening 44.40 split for a Jamaica 'B' Team at the Penn Relays this year, Bolt has been bothered by a number of injuries which slashed his participation in a number of world level meets. And finally, when he did show up at the Athens Olympics, he turned in a sub-par performance that led to a first-round exit.
COACHING SWITCH
His Olympic slowdown triggered the coaching switch from resident coach at the IAAF High Performance Training Centre, Fitz Coleman, to Mills.
Now what's the coach's biggest challenge?
"There are a number of challenges which have to be given equal importance, the first of which is to restore his confidence," Mills pointed out. "This is the first time in his young career that he has experienced disappointment."
"We have to develop a coach/athlete relationship and understanding as early as possible. I have to learn about him as a person and he has to adjust to my coaching methods and demands because each coach has his own signature. I have to get a greater understanding of him because that's important in any relationship.
"I also have to get him in a process, to process him and educate him for the demands of a senior programme since all his experience and success has been at the junior level.
"There is no doubt that he has demonstrated he's an athlete of immense potential. As the World Junior Record holder at 200 metres it is fair to say he has produced a performance no junior has ever done in the history of the sport and that speaks loudly about how far he can reach in the sport of track and field.
"However, it is going to take time for the transition from an athlete with immense potential at the junior level moving to compete at the senior level.
How much time it takes depends on the speed at which he matures physically and mentally because we cannot confuse his physiological prowess (size) to say that he has matured physically. Over the past three years he has achieved tremendous physical changes, he has grown a whole heap - three years ago he was slim.
"With such excessive growth his whole skeletal structure is fragile. Once the growth process slows down he will start to experience greater muscular density and significant increase of the muscular structure and will have less injuries related to the growth process," he said.
EXCELLED AT SENIOR LEVEL
In Stewart, who at 19 years finished sixth in the 100 metres final and won silver as anchor on the sprint relay team at the Los Angeles Olympics in 1984, Mills has coached an athlete who as a junior excelled at the senior level. So he has an idea of the pressure that brings to bear.
In this situation, the coach is under as much pressure as the athlete to deliver. Is he intimidated by the expectations?
"No," stated Mills, "because I too have similar expectations, I share the same expectations."
He further explained that "... my experience working with athletes doesn't follow an upward graph from season to season but there's no doubt he'll fulfil the expectations."
Mills also noted that "not many juniors achieve automatic success at the senior level and the facts from research will bear that out. A number of those who have been successful have achieved it in a four-year span.
"Veronica Campbell was world champion at 100m and 200m in 2000, something no other junior had done in the history of the World Junior Championships. Four years later she's an Olympic champion," he said of Bolt's Jamaican teammate who won 200m and sprint relay gold medals, as well as the 100m bronze in Athens.
Despite that the 55-year-old Mills, who has been coaching for 34 years, says "... this is not to say that Bolt will need four years to obtain the successes which are expected."
Asked if this is the best talent to have come to his hand, Mills, in his measured, calculated manner, said.
"It is difficult to compare one era with another but in this era there's no doubt that Bolt has demonstrated he's a cut above anybody who has preceded him."
It was not a surprising, but rather interesting and somewhat fitting comment as the interview was being done on the cool roof setting of Fisher's Place on Lyndhurst Road where many journalists have a drink. Right above our head was a television set and horseracing was on show. Now, you don't have to be a turfite to know of the many promising three-year-old star horses who were 'shielded' from 'A' Class company and racing is racing, whither the track.
Last year, Bolt, in prime form, was taken to the senior World Championships as a member of Jamaica's team but not allowed to run. Asked is he would have allowed that as the athlete's coach, Mills said:
"In track and field it is always best to exploit the present. When you're on top of your game you must make the best use of it because the next season is not guaranteed to be as successful.
"It therefore could be said that 2003 could be viewed as an opportunity missed."
In spite of this, the coach makes one salient point: "This season, although most of it was lost due to injury, we must not lose sight of the fact that he improved this year over last year in running 19.93."
That's history and Mills says Bolt is ready to tune up for the fast lane again.
"He's going to resume training at the beginning of October for the 2005 season. He's fully recovered from his injuries so he's ready to start training.
"One of the things that I feel that will be a positive is that this season he'll be training with other professional athletes, including Aleen Bailey and Kim Collins," he points out, adding "... and Aleen is a good motivator."
Besides the 200m, Bolt has also proven himself to be a pretty decent quarter-miler and asked about the events to which his training will be geared, Mills said: "Right now we'll be focusing on the 200m but I can see where in the future the 400m could become his most dominant event. He's 6ft. 6ins. and growing. Two years ago he ran 45.25 at Boys' Champs."
Asked if Jamaicans can look forward to Bolt competing on the Grand Prix circuit next season, Mills said: "Yes, because that's where we want to blood him, to get him exposed to senior competition. He's still a junior but he'll be taking no further part in junior competition, no CARIFTA, no CAC (Central American and Caribbean Games).
"We think he has proven himself at CARIFTA where he established the World Junior Record. It is time to move on and concentrate on what's going to occupy the rest of his athletic career. He definitely has to focus on senior athletic competition."
