As a child Fred Kerley would sleep on a pallet, one of 13 kids in a room.
With his dad in jail and mum unable to cope with parenting, he and four siblings were adopted by an aunt named Virginia.
Kerley was two years old when they were taken in, by his own admission “a toddler who didn’t know what was happening around him”.
A quarter of a century later he certainly does, the 27-year old having become 100 metres champion of the world.
“Aunt Virginia will think I did some great things,” Kerley said after clocking 9.86 seconds to lead an American clean sweep of the medals. “From where I have come from – adopted with 13 children sleeping in one household – she will think I accomplished some great things today.”
On one side of him stood Marvin Bracy, whose NFL dream was ended by injury, but who wouldn’t take no for an answer and bounced back to win World silver.
On the other, Trayvon Bromell, who has had so many surgeries he lost count of the number of times doctors had told him he would never again run fast.
Yet the story of the man between them trumped even those tales of human suffering and triumph over adversity.
“We had one bedroom,” Kerley said. “There were 13 of us in one bedroom. We were on the pallet. My Dad ended up in jail, my Mom took wrong turns in life, which meant Aunt Virginia was the only one who could take care of me and my siblings.
“Without her I probably wouldn’t be here right now. I definitely wouldn’t be a world-class athlete, and who knows where I might have ended up in life. What motivates me is coming from what I come from and not being in the same predicament and keep on accomplishing great things.”
Kerley now has the title held three times by Usain Bolt courtesy of a finishing burst that catapulted him from third to first in the last 15 metres.
Bolt was a showman, a larger than life character with the gift of the gab. Kerley is different. He does not use five words where one will do.
Asked why he had run 9.79secs in the heats rather than the final, he replied, deadpan: “Because they had to go to sleep thinking about that 9.7. I didn’t.” For years it was Kerley doing the dreaming, that one day he would have a better life.
At Hayward Field he accomplished that and more, not only bossing his event through the rounds but revealing he has matters under control off the track too.
“I talk to my parents every day,” he said. “What happened before doesn’t happen now. I am a grown man. I can have a relationship with my parents. They were not here tonight but I can guarantee they were watching.”
