There were collective gasps and groans when Mr Oblique Seville was left in the blocks in the World Athletics Championships 100-metre heats in Tokyo.

Resulting speculation was understandable. Was it that Mr Seville, among the globe’s finest sprinters, had been overcome by anxiety?

To his credit, expert television analyst Mr Bruce James got it dead right: Whatever it was that had caused Mr Seville to respond as late as he did to the starter’s gun, the more important point was that he recovered magnificently to grab third place in his heat and an automatic spot in the semi-final.

The crucial question, the analyst suggested, was whether Mr Seville had expended too much energy ahead of the semi-finals and final.

As it turned out, Mr Seville, 24 years old and apparently at his physical peak, not only dominated his semi-final from lane eight, but left all in his wake in the final to win gold in a personal best 9.77 seconds.

His silky, smooth technique as he sped to victory took the breath away.

Countryman Mr Kishane Thompson, also 24, was a step behind, taking silver in 9.82, ahead of defending champion, American Mr Noah Lyles (9.89).

Readers will readily recall that at the Olympic Games in Paris last year Mr Lyles took the 100-metre gold, 5,000th of a second ahead of the physically and mentally powerful Mr Thompson. Back then, Mr Seville was last in the final — nurturing whispers that he lacked the mental strength to handle highest-level pressure.

Pleasingly, Mr Seville dealt frontally with the issue during post-race interaction in Tokyo.

“Track and field is both mental and physical. I think I have mastered the mental side of it…” he was reported by the
British Broadcasting Corporation as saying.

That mental side also came to the fore in the startling performance by 21-year-old Miss Tina Clayton, who took silver in the women’s 100 metres, clocking a personal best 10.76 as she adopted what she told an interviewer was a “tunnel vision” approach.

In the process, she split the huge pre-race favourites, runaway gold medal winner, American Mrs Melissa Jefferson-Wooden and the Olympic champion, St Lucian Miss Julien Alfred.

We are told that not too long ago Miss Clayton contemplated walking away from track athletics, “worn down” by injuries and self-doubt.

We owe Miss Clayton’s relatives, friends, coaches, and others who helped to keep her grounded, strong and focused.

We applaud her thinking that this is “not the time to get complacent because I won a silver medal; it is the time to be hungry for more…”

The approach of Mr Seville and Miss Clayton are life lessons for those in Tokyo, and the rest of us: That it is human to fail and have frailties. However, how we respond to setbacks will ultimately define us.

Finally, we can only imagine the pride of the living legend Mrs Shelly-Ann Fraser Pryce, who at 38 years old placed sixth in the 100m final — her last global individual event; and the greatest of them all, Mr Usain Bolt, who celebrated so joyously in the stands.

They, and other dedicated Jamaican athletes, past and still going — including Miss Shericka Jackson, fourth in Sunday’s 100m final and now eyeing defence of her 200m title — know that their glorious legacy is thriving still.