Usain Bolt of Jamaica cruises to a 400m heat win (© Getty Images)
World Junior 200 metres record holder Usain Bolt will be absent from this weekend's Jamaica International athletics meeting (7 May) because of injury.
The 17-year-old, who clocked a phenomenal 19.93 seconds over 200 metres at the Carifta Games in the Bahamas recently, suffered an injury during practice and has been advised by doctors not to compete.
"He picked up a knee injury in training last Friday and we took him to Dr Cyril Fletcher on Monday (3 May)," said his manager Norman Peart.
"The doctor reckoned that he would not recover sufficiently to participate in such a high quality meet. Usain should be fine a couple days after the meet but it was felt it would be unwise to allow him to run on Friday."
Bolt was expected to give world sprint champion Kim Collins of St Kitts a run for his money on Friday and, according to Peart, Bolt was extremely frustrated at having to withdraw.
"He was very disappointed. He really wanted to run. Usain has a very big following in Jamaica and a lot of the Jamaicans were coming to watch him match up against the big guys," he added.
Star studded line-up
With Marion Jones, Tim Montgomery, Kim Collins and Maria Mutola heading the cast for Friday's meet some very memorable action is of course expected even without Bolt's talent on show.
However, last year's World Championship women's 400m silver medallist Lorraine Fenton Graham, along with 2000 Olympic men's 400m bronze medallist Gregory Haughton will also miss the event due to injury.
