Usain Bolt has been confirmed as the 2022 recipient of the BBC Sports Personality of the Year Lifetime Achievement award.
The Jamaican sprint legend—who retired from athletics in 2017—will be recognised for his services to sport when this year's ceremony is held in Salford on Wednesday (Dec. 21). Eight-time Olympic gold medal-winner Bolt dominated short-distance running for a generation and still holds world records in both the 100-metre and 200-metre sprints.
“I feel accomplished," he told BBC Sport as he looked back upon his illustrious career. "I’ve accomplished all I wanted to in my sport, so it’s just a great feeling to know that with [the] determination and sacrifice that I put in that I could accomplish what I wanted to. I always try to motivate people and say listen, believe in yourself and just go out there and do your best.”
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Among Bolt's biggest achievements is winning back-to-back gold medals in both the 100 metres and 200 metres at three consecutive Olympic Games (2008, 2012 and 2016). An 11-time world champion, Bolt is also the first athlete to win four World Championship titles in the 200 metres.
He became an international icon when he broke his own 100-metre world record at Beijing 2008, where he won in an astonishing 9.69 seconds. He then smashed that time by a 10th of a second exactly one year later when he won the first of three 100-metre world championships with a time of 9.58 seconds in Berlin.
The Lifetime Achievement won't be Bolt's first recognition from BBC SPOTY after he was named World Sport Star of the Year (formerly BBC Overseas Sports Personality of the Year) on three occasions (2008/09, 2012). The 36-year-old joined Muhammad Ali and Roger Federer as the only athletes to win the prize three times, while only Federer (four) has won it more.
Along with his individual successes, Bolt played a major role in some of the most successful relay teams athletics has witnessed. The winning time of 36.84 seconds run by Bolt and Jamaica team-mates Yohan Blake, Nesta Carter and Michael Frater at the London 2012 Olympics also remains a world record.
United States gymnast and seven-time Olympic gold medal-winner Simone Biles was the latest athlete to receive the Lifetime Achievement after it was not awarded in 2020. Other previous winners include Brazilian football icon Pele, 1966 World Cup champion Sir Bobby Charlton and tennis legend Billie Jean King, as well as British Olympians Jessica Ennis-Hill, Tanni Grey-Thompson and Chris Hoy.
England football star Beth Mead —who finished joint-top scorer en route to the Euro 2022 crown earlier this year—is the overwhelming favourite to be named BBC Sports Personality of the Year. Other top contenders for Wednesday's top prize include England team-mate Alessia Russo, seven-time snooker world champion Ronnie O'Sullivan and 2019 winner Ben Stokes.
