LONDON — The moment and the crowd of 55,900 at London Stadium were his, and Usain Bolt was inches from a clean getaway on Saturday night.
But there would be no pitch-perfect ending to what Bolt insisted was the final individual race of his unparalleled career.
The gold medal in the 100 meters at the world track and field championships went instead to Justin Gatlin, the 35-year-old American who has long been Bolt’s foil and who had not won a world 100 title since 2005. Gatlin has served two doping suspensions in his career, and the crowd booed him before the race.