Jamaica smash relay world record

Usain Bolt earned a triple-triple of sprint gold medals and world records today.

With his giant strides, he ran a lighting final bend that set anchor Asafa Powell on the way to a record 37.30 seconds in the 4x100 meters, chopping a massive 0.30s off the mark the United States had held for 16 years.

"Go Asafa!" Bolt shouted after handing over the baton, pointing Powell in the direction of a golden record. And his teammate did exactly that - completing the only great run of his disappointing Olympics to turn reggae into the Olympic anthem of the celebrating Bird's Nest.

And Bolt, never at a loss for words, was not going to wait for IOC president Jacques Rogge to anoint the superlative of the Beijing Games.

"You can't explain the feeling you feel after the greatest Olympics ever," Bolt said.

And who to question him.

If Phelps won eight golds to Bolt's three, he was not perfect, missing a world record in one race. The 22-year-old Bolt was perfection itself, never even close to being challenged whenever he set foot on the track.

Bolt also became only the fourth man, and the first since Carl Lewis in 1984, to win all three Olympic sprint events.

Bolt had already set the world record of 9.69 in the 100 and 19.30 in the 200, but that funky Jamaican was aching for an encore.

And Powell, a former 100m world record holder who only finished fifth in the 100m, provided it. He crossed the line almost a full second in front of silver medalists Trinidad and Tobago, which finished in 38.06s. Japan took the bronze in 38.15s.

"I said to Asafa, 'Can we do this?' And he was like, 'Don't worry, man, we got this one."' Bolt said.

The loss of the world record made the great American sprint debacle complete, failing to get a single gold in six events.