The American Justin Gatlin, Olympic champion in 2004, quadruple world gold medalist and now retired at 40, was one of the great figures of sprinting for more than ten years, without managing to restore an image soiled by two suspensions for doping.
What should we understand of the trajectory of this athlete, ambitious to the end of his toes, arrogant as American sprinters can sometimes be, and returned to the top of the world hierarchy thanks to the leniency of the fight once morest doping?
In 2001, when his name was associated with a positive test, this child from Brooklyn, New York, was not yet 20 years old. But he says he is hyperactive. This is at least his justification for his consumption of amphetamines, for therapeutic purposes according to him.
The International Federation is looking into the case of this 110m hurdles hopeful and accepts his arguments: he will only receive a one-year suspension.
His strides can therefore continue to lengthen from 2002, to the point that his pace will earn him the nickname “Cheetah”.
– Gatlin plays the victim –
Gatlin’s first career is launched: the American runs fast, very fast and will forge a track record as long as his arm.
In 2004, at age 22, he became Olympic champion in the 100m. He saw double the following year with two gold medals at the Helsinki Worlds in the 100 and 200 m.
Gatlin continued his ascent to equal the then world record (9.77) in Doha, Qatar on May 12, 2006.
But the deception is unmasked: three months later, the American announces that he has tested positive for testosterone.
He then adopts what remains his leitmotif, even today: he is in no way at fault, he is the victim of a plot hatched by his masseur.
The inflexibility of the sprinter is disturbing, to the point that four years later Gatlin will declare: “I do not look back. Guilty or not, I have turned the page”.
Guilty or not, he has in any case collaborated with the anti-doping authorities, enough for his sentence, initially set at eight years, to be reduced by half.
Without mercy, there would be no Gatlin story.
He rushes into the breach following a sporadic stint in American football. The second career of the American in athletics can therefore start in the summer of 2010.
– The show must go on –
Its constant is “the show”. No repentance, no apology. But the show, because “that’s what people want”, he asserts.
“You have to realize that the world of athletics is a bit like a soap opera … but with thorns,” the sprinter noted in 2012. “People love me, others love me. hate… But everyone wants to see great competition”.
In his absence, Jamaican Usain Bolt blew everything up. The Jamaican will therefore be its sting, and the phoenix will indeed be reborn from its ashes.
Indoor world champion in the 60m in 2012, bronze medalist a few months later in the 100m at the London Olympics, vice-world champion in the queen discipline in 2013 then in 2015, runner-up to Bolt at the Rio Olympics, Gatlin achieved the comeback of the century with the world title in the 100m in London in 2017, twelve years following that of Helsinki.
In an Olympic stadium entirely committed to Bolt’s cause, he spoils the sprint legend’s last individual race and in return reaps the broca of the London public. However, he has the elegance to prostrate himself at the feet of “La Foudre”, an image that will go around the world.
In 2019, he is still present on the podium of the Doha Worlds (2nd) but misses his ultimate bet: to qualify for the Tokyo Olympics in 2021. Injured in the hamstrings, he misses the final of the American selections and the tears to flow.
There remains an unanswered and yet essential question: how was Gatlin able to run as fast at 35 as when he was doping?
“I’ve never had an injury and found myself away from the sport for four years. My body has rested and feels like a 27-year-old, rather than a 33-year-old sprinter. years,” he replied to AFP in 2015.
