Usain Bolt has just completed his sprint double in a world record of 19.30sec, beating the time of 19.32 set by Michael Johnson at his home Olympics in Atlanta 12 years earlier, a time that was reckoned unlikely to be beaten for 20, perhaps 30 years.

Meanwhile, there is controversy over the bronze. Third-placed Wallace Spearmon of the United States, who clocked 19.95, has been disqualified for running out of his lane.

And hello - there is another twist. It seems the US officials have appealed, then accepted the DQ having watched the replay. But they have also noticed that the second-placed finisher Churandy Martina, still celebrating earning the second-ever Olympic medal for Netherlands Antilles, also appeared to have run out of his lane at one point.

An hour passes and the verdict comes down. Martina is also disqualified, and so two other US sprinters assume the podium places - with Shawn Crawford, originally fourth, taking silver and Walter Dix bronze.

Welcome to the world of short track speed skating.

For while such switchback drama may be relatively rare in Olympic sprinting, it is almost a required element of sprinting's Winter Olympic equivalent - a recognised part of the spectacle, like crashes in Formula One, or knock-outs in boxing.

The latest episode of the Olympic short track drama starts on Saturday (February 10) when the Pyeongchang 2018 competition gets underway at the Gangneung Ice Arena.

And given the fervour with which this sport is followed in South Korea, a nation that stands comfortably atop the medal table since short track became a full Olympic event in 1992, any controversies occurring are likely to achieve maximum amplification.

So what might we expect in this department over the next couple of weeks? Judging by what has gone before, stand by for virtually anything…

My first, first-hand view of the wonder that is short track took place at the Hamar Arena during the 1994 Lillehammer Games. I can picture now the disconsolate figure of Britain's Wilf O'Reilly, holding up the gouged and broken blade of his left boot for the inspection of Her Majesty's press after he had finished last in his 500m heat.

O'Reilly, winner of two events when short track first appeared in the Olympics as a demonstration sport at the 1988 Calgary Games, had been shoved out of contention for a full medal at the 1992 Albertville Games.

The damage to his blade had occurred in a collision immediately after the start which saw the Australian skater Steven Bradbury - we will come back to him - slide into the boards.

Here is the rub - the referees did not allow O'Reilly time to change his blade before the re-start, despite the exuberant protests of the British coach, Archie Marshall.

"There it is in all its glory," said O’Reilly. "The blade just wasn't gliding. When s**t happens, it happens…"

Indeed. Two days earlier he had failed to qualify in the heat of his other individual event, the 1,000m, as he suffered the same kind of damage to the blade on his right boot.

That event had already yielded up its own final drama, as O'Reilly’s 21-year-old team-mate Nicky Gooch skated home second behind the defending champion, South Korea's Kim Ki-hoon, only to be disqualified for a nudge that had sent Canada's Derrick Campbell sliding out of line with just over two laps remaining.

"It's unbelievable to think you have won an Olympic medal and then to have it taken away from you," Gooch said.

He could have been speaking for Campbell, who had picked himself up, dusted himself down and skated on through before celebrating his bronze live on TV with the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation. At which point he was told he had miscalculated the laps by one and had been disqualified. Bronze went to the winner of the B-final, his team-mate Marc Gagnon.

For Gooch, at least, there was the consolation of a bronze in the following 500m event.

There is a curious stat in the women's 500m final result at the 1998 Nagano Winter Games. The bronze medallist finished in a faster time than the gold and silver medallists.

Reason being that the final proved to be another drama-fest in which two of the four skaters involved dropped out of contention for medals - China's Wang Chunlu failed to finish and Canada's Isabelle Charest was disqualified.

This meant that South Korea's Chun Lee-kyung, winner of the B-final in 46.335sec, was promoted to the podium alongside the winner, Annie Perreault of Canada, who clocked 46.568, and runner-up Yang Yang of China, who recorded 46.627.

Four years later I was in the Salt Lake Ice Center for the men's 1,000m final, where home hope Apolo Anton Ohno was desperate for gold in a stacked field that included China's multiple Olympic medallist Li Jiajun, Mathieu Turcotte of Canada, Ahn Hyun-soo of South Korea, who would win three golds at the 2006 Games - and the aforementioned Bradbury.

The amiable Aussie, by his own admission, was "the oldest bloke in the field", and had decided, after squeezing into the semi-finals, that the best bet for him was not to mix it with younger skaters he knew were faster than him, but to hang around and hope for the gold-crazed kids to crash out.

In his semi-final, he was proceeding in last place when three of the leaders, including South Korea's defending champion Kim Dong-sung, crashed, allowing him to proceed to first place.

And in the final, guess what? Same thing. As his four rivals reached the final bend, Bradbury was around 15m behind. Ohno, on the brink of winning, appeared to be brought down with 20m remaining. All three other leaders also spun off, allowing the Australian to glide through and claim his country's first winter Olympic gold with the nonchalant ease of The Reverend Robert Walker skating on Duddingston Loch.

Four days later Ohno's desperate attempts to make amends in the 1,500m final appeared to have ended in failure as he was narrowly beaten to the line by Kim Dong-sung. 

However, Ohno had earlier raised his arm to signal that he was being impeded by Kim as he attempted to pass him with three laps remaining. The Korean appeared to drift to the inside, checking the American's progress.

The South Korean was subsequently disqualified for "cross-checking" - which ignited a fire of indignation in his home country that crackled and burned for many years afterwards.

The Koreans took their appeal all the way to the International Olympic Committee and the Court of Arbitration for Sport - whatever happened that by the way? - without success.

Thousands of protest letters, some of them including death threats, were sent to the IOC and to Ohno. At the World Cup football finals later the same year in South Korea and Japan, two South Korean players celebrated a goal against the US by mimicking what they clearly thought had been the exaggerated reaction of Ohno produced when he thought Kim had skated into his line.

Let us hope, then, that nothing too inflammatory happens in the next two weeks, particularly involving home skaters. 

But the odds are, it will.

Ah well. That, as they say, is fast track…