Usain Bolt’s last 100 metres race: lessons

The legendary Jamaican sprinter Usain Bolt was to run his last 100 metres race before retirement at the World Athletics Championship in London on Saturday, 5 August 2017. The narrative was simple! Unbeaten in four years and with more Olympic Gold medals and more World Athletic Competition Gold medals than any mortal, Usain Bolt’s last race was logically going to be the icing on the cake! The script of Bolt breasting the tape ahead of everyone in his favorite 100 metres race had become routinely familiar.

“Bolt Beaten!”

Being three hours  ahead of GMT, sleep took me over before I could watch the event on TV that Saturday night. When I switched on my TV the following morning Sunday 6 August 2017, my eyes beheld an unexpected and unfamiliar spectacle…..”BOLT BEATEN!” The news item which followed was interesting. The news reader read “…….Usain Bolt has been beaten by two times drug cheat Justin Gatlin…….” Indeed, Justin Gatlin’s victory was greeted with boos. His award of the gold medal was postponed for a while as Sir Sebastian Coe, the Head of the IAA expressed misgivings about awarding a two-time drug cheat a medal. Again, Gatlin was booed as the medal was given him.

Memory Lane

As my brain tried to digest the surprising news I had just heard on TV, a few thoughts welled up in my mind. I found myself going down memory lane to my Second Year Philosophy class in the University of Ghana, Legon, when Professor Gyekye taught us about the HUMAN CONDITION! Simply, it was about how society looked at LIFE……the beginning with birth, childhood, adolescence, adulthood, old age and finally death!

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Disgraced Ben Johnson

When the 100 metre race ended with Usain Bolt in the third position, there was total disbelief! The applause from the crowd was more in honour of Bolt than the winner and gold medalist Gatlin whose international image has been that of a drug cheating villain nobody admired. Indeed, Bolt came third after Gatlin and the young American sprinter Christian Coleman.

The event also took me back to the Seoul Olympics in South Korea in 1988 when the Canadian sprinter Ben Jonson had his gold medal withdrawn for drug cheating after winning the 100 metres sprint. Today his name only rises out of the disgrace and oblivion he sank into, only when high profile drug cheats in sports are discussed.

So, what lessons can be learnt from Usain Bolt’s last race? 

Life’s Unpredictability

Probably, the most predictable thing about life is life’s unpredictability. Who would have predicted that after four years of total domination of the 100-metre race, Usain Bolt would be beaten in his final farewell race to the world? Certainly, the only certainty about this world is its uncertainty.

So called “strong men” like Chile’s President Augusto Pinochet, Democratic Republic of Congo’s Mobutu Sese Seko and Romanian dictator President Ceausescu ended up pitiable sights, emphasizing the often forgotten fact that, we are all ordinary mortals who have no absolute control over our destinies. In spite of their heavy handed Rambo-style leadership which they inflicted on their countrymen and women, they ended miserably. Indeed Ceausescu was executed with his wife on 25 December 1989!

Leaders of nations must learn from what Martin Luther King said when he stated that, “THE ARM OF THE MORAL UNIVERSE MIGHT BE LONG, BUT IT STILL BENDS TOWARDS JUSTICE!”

Humility

The English writer TS Elliott wrote that “Of all the virtues, HUMILITY is the most difficult to attain, because nothing dies harder than the desire to think well of oneself.” For an athlete who has dominated not only the 100 metres race but also the 200 metres race and etched himself into history as the greatest sprinter of all times, losing in his final race would have been a platform to offer excuses for his defeat.

On the contrary, he praised his opponent Gatlin, who the whole world condemned as a drug cheat, for winning. He went further to praise and encourage the young American Chris Coleman who placed second and beat Bolt to the third position. Above all, he acknowledged that his better days were probably over hence his decision to retire.

Leaders have a lot to learn from Bolt in acknowledging Humility as a very essential ingredient in Leadership. While leaders have nothing to lose in being humble, they have everything to lose in being tagged as arrogant! Shakespeare advised humanity to leave the stage when the applause is loudest.

Gatlin Boos

Usually, human beings admire and cheer victors. However, Gatlin’s victory was met with boos. Human beings have a natural sense of justice. Sometimes, the heavy handedness of leaders cows citizens into submission. Ordinary people therefore obsequiously pretend to support and praise such leaders. Once such leaders relinquish power, they are given the real feel of what people think about them. Our neighbour former Burkinabe President Blaise Campaore affords a good example! Others have laid a solid foundation for such future Gatlin judgement!

Conclusion

Shakespeare in his tragedy Julius Caesar stated that “……the evil that men do lives after them. The good is oft interred with their bones…” While one may not dispute this, perhaps it could be added that, sometimes, the evil that men do, lives with them in their lifetime. Additionally, while the good may be interred with their bones, the good also could live with them in their lifetime.

Usain Bolt’s defeat in his final 100 metres race and his humility in accepting it as a clean athlete, emphasized humility as an important attribute of leadership. On the other hand, the boos that greeted the victor Julian Gatlin as a drug cheat is a reminder that, the fear of brutal dictatorship of Leadership notwithstanding, the world, in the words of Martin Luther King, has a MORAL CONSCIENCE, by which judgement will be done!

dkfrimpong@yahoo.com