FanHouse UsainBolt

Usain Bolt is, without question, the fastest man in the world. He owns the record for the 150-meter dash, the 100-meter (where his record is a ridiculous sub-10 seconds), the 200-meter, and, as MDS mentioned, he may as well go ahead and try to add the 400-meters and the long jump trophies to a case that includes 2008 Athlete of the Year.

In the meantime though, he's busy with a new, ahem, pet project: he just adopted a cheetah, which, as you may know, is the world's fastest animal. Seriously.

Usain Bolt is the world's fastest man, but he's not the world's fastest mammal by a long shot. A Cincinnati Zoo cheetah named Sarah has covered 100 meters in 6.13 seconds, besting Bolt's record for humans by nearly three and a half seconds.

The world's fastest man has struck again, as Usain Bolt (pictured above center) cruised to victory Thursday in the 200-meter final at the IAAF World Championships in Berlin, setting a world record in the process with a superhuman time of 19.19 seconds.

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The world's fastest man has struck again, as Usain Bolt (pictured above center) cruised to victory Thursday in the 200-meter final at the IAAF World Championships in Berlin, setting a world record in the process with a superhuman time of 19.19 seconds.

Usain Bolt is the fastest man in the world at 100 meters and the fastest man in the world at 200 meters, so it's not like anyone doubted that he's also the fastest man in the world at 150 meters. But just to prove the obvious, Bolt ran in a 150-meter race over the weekend, and he ran the fastest time ever recorded.

I don't quite understand this one. Michael Phelps -- he of the Olympic record eight gold medals this past year -- was beaten out in the international voting for athlete of the year by Jamaica's Usain Bolt. I mean this as no disrespect to Bolt, who is a stud in every sense of the word. I've gushed about his abilities before. Sure, some might be a bit miffed by the fact that he's been known to showboat from time to time -- including during a race. Overall, though, Bolt is a superstar and would be quite worthy of this accolade in most years.

My problem is that 2008 wasn't most years. Michael Phelps broke the record for the most Olympic gold medals of all time in a single games. He should be an automatic winner.

As I sit around trying to figure out what would compel voters to vote for Bolt over Phelps, I'm only left with the simple realization that many people hate America.

Look, I know we can be ego-centric in this country, and I'm more guilty of that than most people. Knowing this, I tried to figure out what else could have possibly spurred on this voting. Here's what I came up with:

Who can blame him at this point?

Usain Bolt barely even broke a sweat in Beijing this past year when he broke every Olympic record in front of him. The 100 meter world record wasn't even a challenge, as he celebrated for the last 10-15 meters, and he also took down Michael Johnson's 200 meter world record -- which had stood for 12 years.

Now he's going to start running the 400-meter, and there is very little doubt he can easily shatter this record as well -- also owned by Johnson. He's obviously the fastest man in the history of the planet, so I see no possible reason he cannot break this record with ease, barring injury.

In fact, I started doing some thinking about Bolt and his amazing gift. Remember those Man vs. Beast shows on Fox? When they did sprints, they'd pit a sprinter against a giraffe or zebra or something. The human would always burst out of the gate with a lead. Once the animal got a little warmed up and started moving they'd blow by the poor human with ease.

Last Monday night, ESPN introduced a thing called optical-tracking technology, brought in to show how fast different players like Reggie Bush and Adrian Peterson really are.

The Saints young star was kind enough to break two punt returns for touchdowns, each showing that explosiveness most in the Louisiana area have been waiting for. With the new technology, we got to watch Bush reach a top speed of 22 miles per hour. How fast is that if you compared him to other quick-footed humans? The LA Times broke it down.

If you don't think 22 mph sounds that fast, consider this: Jamaican sprinter Usain Bolt averaged 23.07 mph over 100 meters when he took the gold medal with his blistering 9.69-second performance in the Olympics. That's according to EliteFeet.com, which also translated the times of star runners Maurice Greene (21.0 mph in the indoor 60 meters), Michael Johnson (20.71 in the 400) and Florence Griffith Joyner (21.32 in the 100), among others.

Yes, those speeds are averages over the distance, as opposed to Bush's top speed at a given point. But those runners also weren't carrying a football and saddled with a helmet and pads.

With attention spans dwindling, we forego full game-by-game previews to give you the essentials you need to know about every contest this glorious NFL weekend. Click here to go back in time.

The 1s

Tennessee (4-0) at Baltimore (2-1): Okay, fine, I'll agree, the Titans are a good football team. They're giving up just 11.5 points per game, best in the NFL, they have a competent quarterback that doesn't do anything flashy but also doesn't make a lot of mistakes (only one interception in four games) and a rookie running back in Chris Johnson that made every fantasy owner that didn't snag him do a collective head slap. Interesting little comparison here, last week Johnson had just 19 less yards than Adrian Peterson with one less carry and as many touchdowns. Also worth noting, the 4-0 Titans have just one nationally televised game the rest of the season, October 27 against the Colts, while the Browns still have four. Does Al Davis also dabble in national television scheduling? Cool.

Pick -- Tennessee

The world's fastest man, Jamaican gold medalist Usain Bolt, visited David Letterman last night, and Letterman asked Bolt why he didn't run hard through the finish line instead of slowing down at the end of the 100-meter dash:

"Before the finish line you're dancing and whirling around and flapping your arms in celebration," Letterman said. "Now that's not technique. That's something different from running technique, isn't it?"

Bolt tried to make a joke that he wanted to fly, but Letterman wouldn't let it go.