Athletics: Bolt to run at Paris Diamond League

Organisers have shelled out $300,000 to bring the Jamaican track king to the French capital.

PARIS: Olympic sprint champion Usain Bolt has been signed up to run the 200-m at the Diamond League meeting in Paris in July, according to the organisers.

“With Bolt, we know that we will easily fill the Stade de France,” said the head of the meeting, Laurent Boquillet, adding that organisers had shelled out $300,000 to bring the Jamaican track king to the French capital on July 6.

Bolt, 26, won the 100-m, 200-m and 4x100-m relay gold at last year’s Olympics in London, repeating the feat that he first achieved in Beijing four years earlier and cementing his reputation as the greatest sprinter of all time.

Boquillet said the fee was standard for a runner of Bolt’s calibre, pointing out that before his Olympic triple feat last year, he was available for $250,000 per meeting.

Published in The Express Tribune, February 27^th, 2013.