Some of Usain Bolt‘s closest friends aren’t exactly confident he will stay in shape in retirement after this season.
“I have a bet with my managers,” Bolt said on the BBC. “They give me two years before I get a belly, so I can’t let that happen.”
Remember, Bolt is known for not being the healthiest eater. In the last Olympic cycle, he enlisted a chef to keep him away from Kentucky Fried Chicken. Bolt also famously wrote that he ate 1,000 McDonald’s chicken nuggets at the 2008 Beijing Games.
The eight-time Olympic champion’s first scheduled race this season is June 10 in Kingston, what he says is the final meet in Jamaica of his career.
Bolt has not other scheduled meets (yet) before the world championships in London in August, when he is expected to race only the 100m.
“Everybody wants me to continue, but it’s not as simple as it is, you know what I mean? For me, I’ve done what I wanted to do, you know what I mean? I’ve done great in the sport,” Bolt said on the BBC. “People just want to see more and more, you know what I mean? But you as a person have to decide that this is it. I don’t want to continue and then at the end I start losing, because I hate losing.”
Bolt said two years ago that he couldn’t envision ending his career with a loss.
It’s a distinct possibility with Bolt turning 31 in August, slowing in recent years, and the rise of 22-year-old Andre De Grasse of Canada. Not to mention 35-year-old rival Justin Gatlin of the U.S.
De Grasse and Gatlin face off in the Diamond League opener Friday (preview here).
“If you look at a lot of top athletes, that’s the one thing they use to damage their career just a little bit,” Bolt said. “By being so dominant throughout their career, retire, then miss the sport and then come back into the sport to something different, you know what I mean? So I don’t think my coach would coach me [in a comeback], either.”
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