Two-time Olympic reigning sprint double champion Usain Bolt won the 100-metre title at the Jamaican Athletics Championships on Friday night to qualify for August's World Championships.
Bolt, who broke free from the pack after 60 metres, shut it down as he crossed the line in 9.94 seconds, with rising star and training partner Kemar Bailey-Cole second in 9.98 and Nickel Ashmeade third in 9.99.
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Ashmeade is the training partner of Tyson Gay, who ran 9.75 to win at the US Track and Field Championships earlier Friday.u00a0“It was all about getting through it injury free and that’s what I had done,” Bolt said.
Gay and Bolt figure to have a showdown in the 100 at the World Championships in August at Moscow along with defending champion Yohan Blake of Jamaica.
Blake did not run in the Jamaican meet because of a right thigh injury, but as a reigning champion, Blake will still be eligible to run at the worlds despite not competing this week at the Jamaican trials.
Victory no fluke
Olympic bronze medallist Justin Gatlin has brushed aside suggestions that his 100 metres victory over world record holder Usain Bolt was a fluke.
The 31-year-old burst past Bolt in their Diamond League race in Rome last month. “I would not consider it a fluke. I would consider it a prelude to something better and greater.”u00a0