By Mike Rowbottom

Usain_Bolt_in_Lausanne_July_2010January 11 - Usain Bolt (pictured) has made his first commitment of the 2011 season today by announcing he will run over 200 metres at the ExxonMobil Bislett Games on June 9 in Oslo - one of 14 Samsung Diamond League meetings this year.


"I am looking forward to competing for the first time in front of the famous Bislett Stadium crowd," said Bolt.

"I hold three world records but I hear this track has an incredible 69 world records on it so it will be nice to run in such a famous stadium."

The Bislett Stadium track is more noted for middle distance rather than sprint records, but Bolt's friend and rival Asafa Powell demonstrated last year that Oslo can produce swift performances as he equalled his 100m best with a clocking of 9.72sec, although it was marginally illegal for record purposes because of a following wind of 2.1 metres per second - just 0.1mps over the acceptable limit.

Bolt, who holds the world 200m record of 19.19, will have the meeting record of 19.82 set in 1996 by Frankie Fredericks of Namibia in his sights.

"As this year is a World Championship year every meet is important for me in the build up to defending my titles," he said.

"My competition at Bislett and several other Samsung Diamond League meets throughout the season will be an important stepping stone towards that goal.

"My preparations have gone really well - the injury problem I had during the summer is fully healed and my training has gone according to plan.

"I have never been to Norway before so I will come to Bislett prepared and ready to run a fast race and entertain the fans."

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