Bolt's 100m record will be easier to break than 200m: Asafa

Out of the two world records held by track superstar Usain Bolt, his 100m dash timing of 9.58 seconds stands more likely to be broken than the 200m mark of 19.19secs, his fellow Jamaican sprinter Asafa Powell said on Friday.

Former 100m world record holder Powell, who is in India as brand ambassador of the Delhi Half Marathon to be run on Sunday, said that it would be very tough to break Bolt's two individual world records.

"It will be very difficult to break these two records. I feel breaking the 9.58secs (in 100m) could be more likely to be broken, if at all it happens. 19.19secs in 200m is ridiculous," Powell said, when asked which one of the two sprint records could be easier to be broken.

Both the existing 100m and 200m world records were set by Bolt while winning gold medals during the 2009 World Athletics Championships in Berlin.

Powell himself held the world record of 9.72 secs between 2005 and 2008 before Bolt took it over.

33-year-old Powell is known as 'Sub-10 King' for running 100m dash below 10 seconds for 98 times, the maximum by any sprinter and he said he would like to notch up his 'century' of sub-10sec in Jamaica.

"It is difficult to say specifically when I will run my 100th sub-10 sec but I hope it comes sooner than later and I would like to do that in my home country of Jamaica," he said.

Powell said he played cricket for one year during his school days but left the sport for athletics.

"My school cricket team did very badly, so I quit cricket after playing for one year," he said.      "Cricket was earlier very big in Jamaica. It is still big but athletics is bigger now. Chris Gayle is my friend and I love to watch him play and I want to watch cricket. But I don't follow cricket much now because I train in United States and no cricket is shown on TV there."

Asked who's his sporting idol, Powell said, "While growing up I looked up to my eldest brother Donovan (who represented Jamaica in 4x100m relay in 200 Olympics). Later on, I admired Maurice Green. I wanted to run with him, I did and I beat him."

Maurice Green is the former 100m world record holder and 2000 Olympics gold medallist.

Powell took part in a discussion organised to motivate the young athletes to take up the sports. Indian sprint legends Milkha Singh, P T Usha and Ashwini Nachappa took part in it.

Image: Jamaican sprinter Asafa Powell

Photograph: Lucy Nicholson/Reuters