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Comparisons to Usain Bolt are the sort of thing that can add unwanted pressure to young shoulders.

It’s not quite as tough if you’re a pole vaulter, for example, and will never actually have to take on the frankly ridiculous 100-metre and 200-metre world records set by the Jamaican superstar.

But for 18-year-old Erriyon Knighton, a student at Tampa’s Hillsborough High School in Florida, those comparisons seem fair enough and he doesn’t appear too fazed.

Knighton has been on the radar for a while but his 200m sprint at last month’s LSU Invitational has really focused the spotlight in his direction.

He shattered Bolt’s under-20 record of 19,93 seconds, clocking 19,49. Only Bolt, Yohan Blake, and Michael Johnson have ever gone faster.

Incredibly, that time would have won gold at last year’s Tokyo Olympics. Knighton ran in that 200m final, per Axios, became the youngest man to race in an individual Olympic track final in 125 years, and finished fourth.

Let’s see that under-20 record from the LSU Invitational:

When Bolt set his 200-metre world record, he was one day short of 23, so Knighton really does have time on his side:

He was a highly-rated football recruit and was offered a scholarship by Alabama, but he turned professional in track last January and signed with Adidas.

Knighton is 6-foot-3 and still growing. Bolt, who retired in 2017, is 6-foot-5. The two sprinters have similar strides — long, relaxed, almost making it look easy.

In a recent profile for The Wall Street Journal, Ato Boldon, the Trinidadian former 200m world champion, was full of praise:

[He called] Knighton’s feat the junior equivalent of Bob Beamon breaking the long jump world record by nearly two feet.

Image: Getty Images

“If one junior in history, who is considered the greatest sprinter of all time, has broken 20 (seconds), and now this kid is half a second—which is a lifetime in the sprints—faster, then yes. It’s not an exaggeration to say that this is the most Beamon-esque junior performance.”

If he wants to rival Bolt’s incredible career, Knighton will need to excel in the shorter distance as well. This past weekend, he could only clock a sixth-place finish at the Prefontaine Classic 2022.

He is likely to make his World Athletics Championships debut in July at the meeting in Eugene, Oregon.

Athletics fans around the world, and perhaps one rather famous face from Jamaica, will be watching closely.

[sources:axios&wsj]