BEIJING, China — Usain Bolt, after stumbling out of the blocks in his 100m semi-final, showed that he is indeed human. But the recovery performance was just out of this world.

Hunting a spot in the final, Bolt stumbled after three steps but miraculously kept his balance, composure, and his technique to catch rivals close to home with relative ease and earned his spot in the final, clocking 9.96 seconds.

The rest is history. No ordinary person could have done what Bolt did. Bolt admitted he had no idea what happened but his trusted coach, Glen Mills, revealed Bolt probably was thinking too hard.

“Like every human being he felt a lot of the pressure that was there, to the extent that he may have over-reacted, but when all is said and done, he was victorious,” said Mills, who has guided Bolt from a precocious talent into legendary status.

“Basically the semi-final was behind us. Our concentration was on getting a better execution in the final and he was able to do that,” said Mills.

It wasn’t the best of preparations heading into the championships for the Racers’ head coach and his top athlete, as Bolt was struggling with injuries and was not race sharp.

Bolt had just two sub-10 clockings, with a season’s best of 9.87 seconds achieved in London. He won his first- round heat in 9.96 seconds in Beijing which was the sixth fastest of the day. Gatlin, his main rival, on the other hand opened with 9.83 seconds.

Bolt would repeat the same 9.96 seconds in the eventful semi-final but Gatlin went even faster, 9.77 seconds and pulled his countryman Mike Rodgers to 9.86 seconds. Neither would go faster in the final. Bolt won in 9.79 seconds, Gatlin tightened up and stumbled under pressure to 9.80 seconds with Rodgers fifth in 9.94 seconds.

“That’s not the best of Usain but I am completely satisfied with the result,” Mills said with a smile on his face.

Bolt, who started his reign at the Bird’s Nest in the 2008 Olympics, went on to win another Olympic crown in 2012 and has now completed his third World Championships 100m triumph.

“This is the hardest of the titles that he has ever won. It was very challenging because of the challenges he had to face in preparation for Beijing and hats off to him for a real gutsy and champion-like performance,” Mills lauded Bolt.

It was the first time in seven years that Bolt entered a championship and was not the overwhelming favourite to win. Gatlin came in on the back of a 28-race winning streak and posted the five fastest times in the world this year.

At 33 years old, Gatlin lowered his personal best of 9.77 seconds achieved in 2006 when he was caught cheating to 9.74 seconds in 2015, then followed up with times of 9.75 twice, 9.77 and 9.78 seconds.

“He did more than enough to establish himself as the man to beat and it turned out exactly that. If we wanted to win we would have to beat Gatlin.

“Usain is a competitor and a champion, so getting him to be in the frame of mind wasn’t difficult,” he noted.

“This is the most difficult one, so we are happy that we were able to overcome,” Mills said.