Jamaica is back on the sprint throne – for the first time since Usain Bolt ten years ago, a fellow countryman, Oblique Seville, becomes world champion over 100 meters

Usain Bolt traveled to Tokyo specifically to place the medal around the neck of the 100m winner. And the living sprint legend immediately laid out the plan: He expected two Jamaicans to finish first and second. No sooner said than done: Oblique Seville overtook the fastest runner of the year, Kishane Thompson, in the final meters and won in 9.77. Confident title holder Noah Lyles of the USA was left with only bronze.

Jamaican Seville ran a personal best in the final, as did American Melissa Jefferson-Wooden, who triumphed in the women's race with a time of 10.61. The world witnessed her run the fastest World Championship race in history, and the third fastest among the men. Seville can still claim a record: At just 170 centimeters tall, he is the shortest world champion in history.

Bolt was a full 26 centimeters taller, but his smaller compatriot achieved what many had struggled to achieve. He won the first gold medal in the men's sprint since 2016, when Bolt last triumphed on the world stage at the Summer Games in Rio. He also made his coach Trevor Francis the first man to win the title.

The Kingston sprint guru produced multiple women's world and Olympic champions in Shelly-Ann Fraser and Elaine Thompson, and Asafa Powell set multiple world records under him. But he had to wait more than twenty years for the first man to win the 100m world title. His satisfaction was all the greater when Oblique Seville overtook Thompson, trained by former Bolt coach Glen Mills, in the final meters of the Tokyo final.

But even after these World Championships, Bolt remains the dominant figure in the sprint; no one else has ever dominated for so long, and his world record of 9.58 seconds still seems like another world today. Now, a study funded by his equipment supplier Puma claims to show that the Jamaican would have been much faster with modern spikes. The calculated time: 9.42.

Such speculation arose before, when Nike introduced a shoe specifically designed for the 100-meter race called the Viperfly . The spikes were said to be so revolutionary that even moderately talented athletes could run faster than Bolt. The shoe was supposed to be launched in 2021, but never went into mass production.

The New York Times reported that the shoe manufacturer, out of remorse, never submitted the model to the world governing body for homologation. That sounds downright outrageous. It's more likely that Nike didn't market the shoe because it wouldn't have complied with the regulations, which World Athletics formulated to prevent excesses in the development of so-called super shoes. Otherwise, athletes would probably have been running around with trampolines on their feet someday.

The fact is that these shoes significantly improve running economy thanks to the use of highly reactive foam and a carbon plate in the midsole. This has been proven in various studies. The effect increases with increasing running distance. In sprints, however, it has so far been evident across the board, but not at the absolute top. Today, significantly more women and men are running under 11 seconds and under 10 seconds than ten years ago. In 2015, 20 women and 27 men remained below the stated limits; this year, the figures are 36 and 37, respectively.

These figures seem to confirm that the shoes work somewhat better for female sprinters than for male sprinters. This is also confirmed by the trend at the world's elite: seven of the ten fastest times ever recorded for women have now been set using superspikes, compared to just four for men.

The women's world record of 10.49 meters, set by American Florence Griffith-Joyner, is considered highly dubious. Presumably, the anemometer was defective, and Flojo was blown down the finish line by a moderate hurricane. If Griffith-Joyner's time weren't still in the record books, Elaine Thompson would have set the record in 2021 with a time of 10.54 meters in superspikes. In the men's race, however, five athletes using conventional models were faster than Kishane Thompson, who holds the record with superspikes at 9.75.

Experts believe that three factors play a key role in sprinting. The first is the fact that a 100-meter race is very complex and consists of several phases. During the start and acceleration, the foam in the sole reduces power transmission and therefore has a decelerating effect; only at full speed does the spring effect take effect.

Even there, however, it can't fully develop because the feet only touch the ground very briefly during sprinting. This so-called ground contact time is less than 100 milliseconds. The feet of marathon runners stay on the ground about three times longer; the gas-enriched foams in the midsole therefore have more time to return the energy stored during impact.

The third factor is weight. The lighter the athletes, the more they benefit from the cushioning effect. Women therefore have an advantage, which is particularly evident over longer distances. With super shoes, the world record for the 10,000 m was reduced by 21 seconds, and for the 5,000 m by 13 seconds. For the men, the reductions were 6 and 2 seconds, respectively.

The Puma-funded study on sprint spikes has not yet been published. However, it's safe to assume that the scientists didn't have much data to rely on. Road running shoes can be tested on a treadmill, but a 100-meter race can't be replicated in the lab.

What's certain is that Bolt didn't wear miracle shoes when he set his world record in 2009. However, Bolt was a slow starter and, at 94 kilograms, a heavyweight among sprinters—both factors that presumably limit the effectiveness of modern spikes. When Nike built the Viperfly in 2021, the Jamaican described such shoes as "creepy and unfair." Now, as his partner Puma presents the world record study, he says, "I probably would have been much faster with such shoes."

The Jamaican had no need to make himself bigger than he already is. He was far superior to his competitors for almost a decade, running fabulous times without any technological gimmicks. Among the generation of sprinters who came after him, there's no one anywhere near his class. Shoes or no shoes, Bolt's 9.58 seconds over 100 m will likely remain unmatched for quite some time.