Thunder-BOLT

So beauty finally triumphed over The Beast. The beauty of Usain Bolt’s grace, the beauty of his style and the beauty of his sheer power and pace.

And the sheer magnificence of a great Barnum and Bailey showman able to put on the big performance when it mattered most — on the night when he was confirmed once again as the fastest man on the planet. And a winning time of 9.63sec, the quickest anywhere since he set his 100 metres world record of 9.58 in Berlin in 2009. And a time that had an 80,000 crowd holding its breath as old Lightning Bolt, the nearest thing to a bullet train, came accelerating through the field to take his fourth Olympic gold medal.

It was too much for his stunningly talented Jamaican club-mate Yohan Blake, aka The Beast, and the Athens 2004 champion Justin Gatlin. Bolt had given Blake his nickname as the 22-year-old produced a series of outstanding performances over the last couple of years that marked him down as heir apparent to the great man.

Blake went into the race as the main threat to Bolt’s almost regal status in his sport. The boy from Montego Bay had beaten Bolt in the 100m and 200m in the Jamaican trials after claiming Bolt’s 100m world crown following his Daegu disqualification last summer. The man from Trelawney had called it a wake-up call.

It was more than that, though, as Bolt hadn’t beaten his training partner in nearly two years over 100m. But neither Blake nor the rest of the classiest field ever assembled for a 100m final could prevent the double Beijing gold medallist becoming only the second man after Carl Lewis to retain his Olympic crown. Bolt won in a new Olympic record after his 9.69 in Beijing. Silver went to Blake in 9.75 as he equalled his personal best, bronze to Gatlin in 9.79.

Incredibly, all eight finalists qualified in times under 10 seconds — and with seven doing the same in the final as well it was a new mark for the Olympics. It would have been a clean sweep but Asafa Powell pulled up with a recurrence of a long-term groin injury.

No one had been ruling out a world record, either. But this time Bolt could not quite lay it on for us. The stadium had been packed for the most high-profile event of the Games — not a seat to spare and the Press tribunes overflowing with Olympic volunteers who all wanted to say: “I was there.” And they weren’t let down.

Because of his height and the time it takes to get out of the blocks, 6ft 5in Bolt always gives his rivals a chance early on. And so it was that Tyson Gay and Blake broke quickest. It took a huge effort for Bolt to draw level at 50m. But this is where the turbo-charger kicked in . . . and he was away. The crowd knew it and the noise level doubled in a stadium that was already breaking every late-night disturbance regulation. By the end he was a yard clear as the rest of the field scattered in his wake. Then he was down on his knees to kiss the track, back up on his feet to do his famous Lightning pose and then off on a lap of honour with Blake. The atmosphere inside the stadium was as electric as ever.