Olympic Men’s Track Records

The Summer Olympics is basically the world’s biggest track meet. While athletes and more rabid fans may cherish the World Championships and place more value on them, your casual viewer wants to know who’s fastest in the world every four years.

Records are made to be broken, as Jamaica’s Usain Bolt proved once again in sweeping the 100 and 200 meters races in Beijing, setting Olympic and world records in both events and becoming the first man since Carl Lewis in 1984 to win both in a single Olympics.

Here are the current Olympic records in major track events through Aug. 20, 2008:

100 meters: Usain Bolt, Jamaica (9.69 in 2008)

200 meters: Usain Bolt, Jamaica (19.30 in 2008)

400 meters: Michael Johnson, USA (43.49 in 1996)

800 meters: Vebjorn Rodal, Norway (1:42.58 in 1996)

1,500 meters: Noah Ngeny, Kenya (3:32.07 in 2000)

5,000 meters: Kenenisa Bekele, Ethiopia (12:57.82 in 2008)

10,000 meters: Kenenisa Bekele, Ethiopia (27:01.17 in 2008)

Marathon: Carlos Lopes, Portugal (2:09.21 in 1984)

110 meter hurdles: Xiang Liu, China (12.91 in 2004)

400 meter hurdles: Kevin Young, USA (46.78 in 1992)

3,000 meter Steeplechase: Julius Kariuki, Kenya (8:05.51 in 1988)

4×100 meter relay: Jamaica, Asafa Powell, Nesta Carter, Usain Bolt, Michael Frater (37.10 in 2008)

4×400 meter relay: USA, LaShawn Merritt, David Neville, Angelo Taylor, Jeremy Wariner (2:55.39 in 2008)

Source: Olympic.org