Former Trinidad and Tobago’s sprinter Ato Boldon along with fellow IAAF Ambassadors Frankie Fredericks and Michael Johnson were presented at the traditional pre-event press conference of the IAAF/BTC World Relays in the Nassau Bahamas on Friday (1).
The 2nd IAAF World Relays begins Saturday afternoon (May 2) and concludes on Sunday at the Thomas A Robinson Stadium.
At the press conference, Boldon was questioned about his memories of the 1996 Olympic Games 200m final.
“My memories are completely different to these two (Johnson and Fredericks) as I was in my last year of university. I was also a fan of the sport even before I became a competitor and I had even been introduced to the sport watching Michael and Frankie,” Boldon said.
Boldon, the 1997 World 200m champion, noted that he went into race to run his best “but there was a part of my brain which said, “These two guys you are running against are two of the best ever in the history of this event.”
Boldon, the 1998 Commonwealth Games 100m and Goodwill Games 200m champion, continued: “I had been running at a world class level in that event for all of about 11 months so I knew that I had to have something extraordinary to happen and these two had to have a very bad night just to be competitive.
Bolt remembered that when he “came off the turn and I’m in pretty good shape but I was in lane six, the guys on my outside didn’t run a good first 100, and Michael and Frankie are inside me. At 90 metres I’m like “I don’t see anybody, I’m doing well.” Then the gold shoes go past me and the rest is history.
He added: “I don’t look back on that race with any regrets. I know there is nothing I could have done that night to change the colour of my medal. In my whole career I never ran as fast as 19.32 or 19.68,” Boldon said of his bronze medal in Atlanta.
Boldon was a sprint double bronze medallist at the Games. He won silver and bronze at the following Games in Sydney in the 100m and 200m respectively.
