Society, economy & sport

Usain Bolt runs 9.58 seconds

16 August 2009

On 16 August 2009, in the World Championships at the Olympic Stadium in Berlin, the Jamaican sprinter Usain Bolt won the 100 metres in 9.58 seconds, lowering his own world record from 9.69 seconds, which he had set at the Beijing Olympics a year earlier, by 11 hundredths, the biggest improvement in the era of electronic timing. He reached a top speed of nearly 45 km/h. Four days later, he ran the 200 metres in 19.19. At the 2008, 2012 and 2016 Olympics he won the 100, 200 and relay each time, though the relay gold of 2008 was later taken away over a teammate's doping. Both his records still stand.

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