Most track and field athletes would have quit the sport years ago if they had gone through the injury struggles endured by Yohan Blake.
The youngest World 100m champion in history had the prime of his career significantly affected by a number of injuries, none more devastating than a torn hamstring he sustained at the Glasgow Grand Prix in 2014.
Blake felt a sharp pain during the 100m race that was initially diagnosed as a cramp but, upon further evaluation, was determined to be a hamstring tear so bad that his muscle actually came off the bone.
Blake had to have surgery where they re-attached the muscle to the bone using aluminum, causing him to miss the rest of the 2014 season.
During the most recent episode of Out D Blocks on the Sportsmax.tv YouTube Channel, the 2012 double Olympic silver medallist reflected on his immediate reaction to the injury.
“When that happened to me, I went into the hills for two weeks. No one knew where I was and I cried,” Blake said, noting that he naturally had doubts about every returning to his old form.
So how did he get out of this funk and decide to move forward? Self-affirmation is how.
“I finally talked to God and said listen, you are the second fastest man on the planet. What are you doing?”
“I talked to Brigitte (Foster-Hylton) because she had the same injury and came back and won the World Championships. I talked to my manager and my team and came back and started to do little training and felt more confident,” Blake added.
Fast forward 10 years later, Blake, now 34, just had a season to forget on the track by his standards.
He had a 100m season’s best of 10.16 done in May and failed to make Jamaica’s team to the 2024 Paris Olympics.
Nagging injuries was the main contributor to his lack of success last season according to Blake, with even the injury suffered back in 2014 still affecting him to this day.
“I still struggle with a lot of injuries,” he said.
“Last year, I tried to change up my routine being more specific in my lifting and my running and I got some aches and pains, even from my previous injury when my muscle came off my bone and they had to re-attach it with aluminum so it’s a bit rigid. It bothers me a lot,” he added.
In a lot of situations with athletes who suffer major injuries, they are able to put out full effort in training but once they get into the competition, a metal block affects their performance due to a fear of getting hurt again.
Blake says this has also affected him since the injuries.
“It has. Training with Glen Mills, before I left, he said to me ‘Yohan, if you’re going out there with that mindset, it’s better you stop,’” he said.
“From that, I changed my routine. You’re still going to pick up niggles along the way and the wear and tear of the body. Usain said ‘Yohan, when you reach a certain age you’re going to feel this.’ A lot of times when I was training with Usain, he started to feel some pain and everything and he’d tell me I’d feel some of these pains and I shrugged it off because I was young and I finally understand what he meant,” he added.
As previously stated, athletes who have suffered the injuries he’s suffered usually don’t last as long in the sport as he has.
With all the injuries, Blake still holds the title of second fastest man to ever walk this earth.
“Thank God for what I have achieved because not many persons in the world can say they have achieved what I have achieved,” he said.
“There comes a point in time when you understand, even though you have people saying quit or stop, those are the things that drive me. You can’t tell me to quit. They can’t tell me to quit. They can say anything but they can’t make me quit. I have to make me quit,” he added.