What if we told you Usain Bolt could have won more than just 8 Olympic golds in his career? Not that they are any less, but a few more couldn’t have hurt, right? Well, this was quite a possibility. But in 2004, the year when Bolt turned pro, a series of ill-fated incidents had struck him. They left him feeling on the edge, rather than confident and ready as he should’ve been for the Olympic year. And naturally, his performance on the big stage suffered.

In 2004, Usain Bolt made his big Olympic debut in Athens, but it was hardly anything he’d ever imagined. Finishing fifth in the 200-meter heat, his only event, Bolt’s 21.05 timing saw him fizzle out of the competition in the very first round. Yes, he had missed qualification by a mere 0.03 seconds. But not many know why. After all, what happened in 2004 that turned Athens into that dark blot on this otherwise spotless resume?

As Usain Bolt detailed in his book Faster than Lightning (2013), he suffered a hamstring injury when he was racing in the junior ranks in 2004. It felt like a curse but Bolt pulled through, making up his mind that he was going to the Games. “My summer was not big on fun. To h-ll with the bad back and those tight hamstrings, it was decided that I was going to Athens, whether I liked it or not,” he wrote. But he soon realized, “I couldn’t get excited about entering an event when I wasn’t fully fit.”

After all, the Olympics represent the pinnacle of the sport. So the feeling of being unprepared and having missed the 2004 World Junior Championships was weighing heavily on him. He also knew his fitness levels were seriously questionable. Thus he wrote, “My first season as a pro athlete had been a non-starter up to that point. I’d missed most of the 2004 European events through injury, and several race appearances which had been arranged at the start of the campaign were canceled. Going to Greece was a pain in the a– to me.”

Imagine, the biggest opportunity of his life was something he wasn’t looking forward to at all. But the reason was obvious and pretty much beyond Usain Bolt’s control. However, his coach stepped up for him. Unable to understand why he couldn’t work out and was suffering so much pain in his back and legs, Coach Coleman arranged for him to visit Dr Hans Müller-Wohlfahrt, a German specialist. Turns out the doctor was a genius, and Bolt did eventually land in Athens. But the injury troubled him, forcing the Jamaican to return empty-handed.

But these weren’t the only reasons. Several other factors also led to Usain Bolt’s Athens’ failure.

Usain Bolt’s biggest regret that cost him the Athens glory

Did overconfidence and rash teen decisions cost Usain Bolt? Well probably. On the High-Performance podcast 2024, Bolt revealed, “Because of my talent, I was like,’I’m doing well. I did well at the Jamaican trials.” But when he failed to even proceed to the semis at the Olympics, he realized how far behind he was. And that for Bolt was a wake-up call. He reminded himself, ‘Listen, you have a long way to go.’ 

Also, there’s another thing that Usain Bolt regrets. He knew that in 2003; he was running faster than anyone else. So back in 2021, he confessed that had he participated in the World Championships, he would have won gold in Athens. A part of this is also because Bolt was distracted in his youth. Even in high school in Jamaica, he’d become a known face. On top of it, he had no one to remind him occasionally to take this seriously except for his coach, who would ask him to train hard.

Nonetheless, the best part is that Bolt could learn from his mistake and he used it as a springboard to bounce back in the coming years. What do you think about this? Let us know below!