Allan Wells took the Gold Medal for the 100m (and the silver for the 200m) at the 1980 Games in a time of 10.25s (and 20.21s). This year of course lacked the presence of the American athletes (among others) but the Scotsman later that year recorded victories over some of America's best, and in later years would manage to outrun Carl Lewis and Ben Johnson (though the condition/motivation of the Americans following the boycott may have contributed?).
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5PJJsLorhXEhttp://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M21ga9-xJrgWells never ran (with legal wind)faster than 10.11 (in the 1980 semis) or 20.21 (final). He's certainly no Bolt.
But there are some peculiarities to his career that I think are interesting to look into:
1. Wells began as a long jumper (24 foot roughly) and did not break 11 seconds until he was about 24 years old.
2. He seemed to train with fairly limited track work, focusing a lot on body weight exercises (in very large volumes) and plyometrics, perhaps due to the cold weather in Scotland (not terribly conducive to sprinting).
3. The most peculiar aspect of his training was his use of the "speed ball"
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XLWMJ83HJggThe speed ball it seems was the (or one of the) major focuses in his training. Typically they would do six sets of 3 minutes on, 1 minute rest, trying to get 4.5 hits per second. The rationale behind this, it seems, was 1) to provide general aerobic/cardiovascular conditioning to support intense work later on without stressing the legs 2) to teach the nervous system to move over quickly, following the concept that the legs follow the arms (?)
This idea of nervous system recruitment through upper body work intrigues me as it seems (if actually effective) like an interesting way to help develop (not fully develop!) speed (or the neural patterns that are conducive to speed) without such severe risk of injury that is found in all out sprinting (though of course all out sprinting, in the end is what must be done)
Here are some interesting threads from Charlie Francis' site:
http://www.charliefrancis.com/community/showthread.php?18168-question-about-allan-wells-traininghttp://www.charliefrancis.com/community/showthread.php?13458-Allan-Wells-TrainingJust throwing this out there