Bolt cruises into 200m final, Ashmeade joins him

Bolt, the reigning two-time Olympic and three-time World champion, won his 200m semifinal in 19.95 seconds, appearing to spend time during his race looking up at a stadium video screen and, briefly, across to the second-place finisher.

Botswana’s Isaac Makwala could grab headlines by becoming the first man from his country to win a world title after qualifying fastest for the final with a time of 44.11 seconds, while South African Wayde van Niekerk will be a dark horse.

How much of his comments are kidology with Gatlin in mind is not clear but, on the evidence of the 100m and the manner in which the American stumbled, Bolt has certainly got into his head. “I don’t know if I can reach the finals but I think I can go faster”, added the youngster, whose father is Ghanaian.

“I was trying to make sure I ran at least 130m of the race and then I kind of shut it down”.

The fastest time of the heats, whoever, came from Ramil Guliyev, who ran quick times as a junior, but lost a big chunk of his career to a ban after deciding to represent Turkey rather than his native Azerbaijan.

Nine-time world champion Usain Bolt has cruised into the semi-finals of the men’s 200m with victory in his heat. Gatlin also outran Bolt in the 100 heats. I made some mistakes at the end of the race but now I’m going for the 200.

“Sometimes it has to be fuel”, Gatlin told The Associated Press as he left the Bird’s Nest to cool down at the nearby practice field following a preliminary heat of 20.19 seconds.

“For me, my 200 is my best event”, Bolt said.

The American qualified from heat two in 19.87 seconds ahead of Panama’s Alonso Edward, who is also anticipated to be in the medal hunt come Thursday’s final. Egypt’s Ihab Abdelrahman El Sayed won silver with 88.99m and Finland’s Tero Pitkamaki won bronze.

“It was a good run, now I’ll prepare for the next one”, he said. “I’m not expecting to just turn up and not compete because he’s a great competitor”.

“But given the year the sport has had, I was delighted Bolt won, because basically that single run by him gives the sport a chance to sort out its future”. “Obviously, the semi-final didn’t go to plan, but it was better he did it in the semi and not the final”.

In the men s long jump final, Olympic title-holder Greg Rutherford will fight it out with America s Jeff Henderson and defending champion Aleksandr Menkov of Russian Federation.

On a night when javelin thrower Julius Yego and steeplechaser Hyvin Kiyeng Jepkemoi extended the surprising lead of the Kenyans in the medals table to six gold, two of their teammates were provisionally suspended following initial positive doping tests.