Carl Lewis successfully made history in 1991 when he dominated the 100m track with his incredible speed and sheer talent. The 63-year-old lived through an illustrious career with nine Olympic golds before retiring in 1997. However, an interesting twist to his track speed was how his primary event wasn’t the 100m spring in the first place!
In a candid conversation with World Athletics, the legend sat down to talk about his track and field career and how he once gave his best performance at the Tokyo World Championships in 1991. Lewis held expertise primarily in the long jump category, apart from 100m, 200m, and the 4x100m relay events.
The video from the competition played in front of him as he watched his sprint to the finish line. He recalled how he had in fact gotten a bad start at the first 10m of the race, and he lagged behind his other competitors.
However, things changed when he speedily caught up to everyone and made it past the finish line just in time before anyone else. The run was unbelievably iconic not only because of Lewis‘ comeback from a bad start but also because he managed to set a world record for the 100m sprint at the time, clocking in at 9.86s.
“It wasn’t my best event…”
Though primarily a long jumper, 8-time Olympic and 9-time world champion @Carl_Lewis broke the 100m world record at the 1991 World Champs in Tokyo.
Watch him relive this historic moment exclusively on Inside Track https://t.co/N5pa0hDsC1 pic.twitter.com/2q4gkabkVR
— World Athletics (@WorldAthletics) July 19, 2024
“…it wasn’t my best event and it wasn’t my number one event. It was an added event. I was a long jumper…”
After breaking the world record and having his teammates Leroy Burrell and Dennis Mitchell by his side, Lewis described how the entire arena had an “electric” atmosphere with loud cheers and applause. At 30, the race served him the exact outcome he would’ve hoped for.
“It was an incredible race and I knew that was the race I wanted to run which doesn’t happen…”
Lewis has been one of the longest-standing legends that even other sprinters look up to for inspiration. One of the classic anecdotes that recently came to light was how fellow track legend Linford Christie was influenced by him.
Linford Christie shared a unique moment surrounding Carl Lewis
Recently, Netflix took the track and field world by storm with the release of one of the most poignant documentaries about the athletic stars on track – ‘Sprint’. It featured some of the most popular icons, like Noah Lyles, Zharnel Hughes, Sha’Carri Richardson, and legends like Christie.
In a segment talking about how Hughes managed to beat Christie’s 100m record, the creators wanted the legend to recall his good old days of training. At that time, he remembered how he got his drive to focus and work hard towards being the fastest on track.
It turns out, Christie kept a picture of Lewis under his mat since he was the most dominant athlete at the time. He wanted to beat the best so badly that he resorted to a unique mental trick to reward him with a champion mindset.
