Usain Bolt: My Story
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mikesiva
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I've got my hands on the great man's book, and it makes for an interesting read....
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mikesiva
- Posts: 19320
- Joined: Wed Mar 24, 2010 11:30 am
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Welcome, jastar!jastar wrote:i want to get the book, but every soon.
This is a young forum, but it should build as the Commonwealth Games draw near....
I strongly recommend the book. Here's an excerpt you might find interesting:
"It is possible for me to run 9.4. You can't be sure when or where, but the major championships are when I take it seriously and shine through. That's business time, and I'm not going to let anyone take my titles away, so the World Championships in Korea in 2011 or the London Olympics in 2012 are where it will probably happen.
"To get from 9.58 to 9.4 will involve a lot of hard work - it will have to be the perfect race from the start, through the drive phase, to making sure my focus is straight ahead and maintaining my form to the end. I've never been the best starter, but it's improving, and I must stop looking from side to side, which is my worst habit. I lose time that way, but I can't help it. My coach Glen Mills says he could cure the problem in an instant by putting blinkers on me like they do with racehorses.
"There is always something that could be better. Even when I think a race has gone well, Coach will say 'no' and take me back through it, pointing out all the faults. If you rn 9.58 you are entitled to think it all came together, but Coach tells me the drive phase out of the blocks was too short, I got too tight in the middle, and my head was all over the place, so there's room for improvement." pp21-2
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mikesiva
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- Joined: Wed Mar 24, 2010 11:30 am
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Here's what Bolt has to say about talent vs training....
"I'm so lucky that I'm raw talent. If I really worked at it I could be extremely good indeed, but I never have. Yes, I put the effort in at times, but I could do more. I'm able to run 9.9 seconds in a competitive 100m race without any training at all. If I train right, eat right, go to the gym all the time and dedicate myself 100 per cent, then I definitely will do crazy times. At the moment I still don't do everything 100 per cent, missing gym and training sometimes, and not doing all my workouts. It's hard, man. I don't know how some sportsmen do it.
"But coach will never let me neglect training completely. If he says we need to get things done, we get them done. He knows what I'm like, but I respect him enough to know that when he says it's time to work, then it is. Everything goes on hold, even parties. I've proved I can get serious, it's just doing it over a sustained length of time that is the difficulty.
"When I'm in full swing, I get down to the Spartan Gym in Kingston in the morning and do a full one-hour workout which involves weights, bench presses, leg presses, tricep pull-downs, behind head pull-downs, arm curves, rowing, calf raises, leg extensions, special abs work and maybe a few squats - although not too many with my dodgy back, and definitely no treadmill because if I jog for too long my calf gets tight." pp237-8
"I'm so lucky that I'm raw talent. If I really worked at it I could be extremely good indeed, but I never have. Yes, I put the effort in at times, but I could do more. I'm able to run 9.9 seconds in a competitive 100m race without any training at all. If I train right, eat right, go to the gym all the time and dedicate myself 100 per cent, then I definitely will do crazy times. At the moment I still don't do everything 100 per cent, missing gym and training sometimes, and not doing all my workouts. It's hard, man. I don't know how some sportsmen do it.
"But coach will never let me neglect training completely. If he says we need to get things done, we get them done. He knows what I'm like, but I respect him enough to know that when he says it's time to work, then it is. Everything goes on hold, even parties. I've proved I can get serious, it's just doing it over a sustained length of time that is the difficulty.
"When I'm in full swing, I get down to the Spartan Gym in Kingston in the morning and do a full one-hour workout which involves weights, bench presses, leg presses, tricep pull-downs, behind head pull-downs, arm curves, rowing, calf raises, leg extensions, special abs work and maybe a few squats - although not too many with my dodgy back, and definitely no treadmill because if I jog for too long my calf gets tight." pp237-8