Olympic athletes aren’t in it for the money.
Unlike Premier League footballers who can earn hundreds of thousands of pounds every week, most athletes won’t see a fraction of that.
Many are paid a pittance in comparison for slogging their guts out for the love of their sport and a chance at Olympic glory every four years.
But Usain Bolt is not just another athlete.
While it was revealed that Team GB gold medal winners wouldn’t be paid a penny more for striking gold – for triple gold medal-winner Bolt, the story couldn’t be more different.
He cleaned up yet again with three golds at the Rio 2016 Games in the 100m, 4x100m relay and 200m events. That’s a hat-trick of triple golds in his past three Olympic competitions, making him the most decorated sprinter in the history of the sport.
But he’s not just rolling in gold on the track, he’s absolutely swimming in the stuff off it too.
https://www.instagram.com/p/BJHO71FBVxd/?taken-by=usainbolt
He was the only athlete to make it onto the Forbes Rich List with a huge personal wealth that saw him bank in excess of $32m this year, putting him just outside the world’s top 30 highest-earning sports stars. That’s 10 times the amount earned by any other leading athletes like Britain’s Mo Farah.
He amassed this incredible fortune thanks to prize money from competing around the world and also his many lucrative sponsorship deals.
The lightning-quick Jamaican boasts a stable of 10 global partners and another seven regional ones which keep his bank balance swelling.
But his biggest cash cow is undoubtedly his deal with global sportswear giant Puma. He is reportedly picking up $10m a year off the brand in a huge deal that runs to 2025 – long after Bolt will have finished competing.
It includes bonuses for wins and world records
He signed with Puma back in 2002, but after his heroics in Beijing, some of the world’s biggest companies wanted him as the face of their brands.
Now he is paid anywhere between $1m and $4m a year by the likes of luxury watch manufacturer Hublot and other brands like Virgin Media and Visa to be in their ad campaigns.
https://www.instagram.com/p/BEZjmlxocSJ/?taken-by=usainbolt
Bolt even had his own character in the game Temple Run which has been downloaded more than one billion times, which is a tidy little earner for him.
His commercial deals dwarf what he earns in prize money on the track though. Business Insider reports that Bolt only earns $10,000 for every race he wins in the Diamond League (not bad for 10 seconds’ work, to be fair) and winning the World Championships nets him $60,000 (he’s won it 11 times).
But he can earn up to $400,000 for appearance fees and Forbes say he has clocked up $2.5m in wins and appearance fees in the past 12 months alone.
He doesn’t seem to have any trouble spending his money either.
Bolt likes his cars, and even though he was given a special edition gold Nissan GT-R often his triple at London 2012, he splashed out $105,000 on this black GT-R.
When he’s not behind the wheel of one of these, he’s getting about by private jet.
Work hard for this life!!! pic.twitter.com/C1XHKYZ60M
— Usain St. Leo Bolt (@usainbolt) April 19, 2016
A big chunk of his wealth has gone on property, with Bolt snapping up a huge pad in Kingston in his native Jamaica for an undisclosed fee as well as property on Rum Cay Island in the Bahamas.
It's that time of Sunday evening #ChillVibe pic.twitter.com/Rokb2TsewV
— Usain St. Leo Bolt (@usainbolt) September 20, 2015
But he’s also know for his philanthropic side too. Whilst raking it in, he’s also doling it out.
Just last year he gave $1.3m to his old school Thorpe William Knibb Memorial High School for sports equipment.
The sprinter also donates to other causes in his community, including the $4m he provided to help renovate a health centre in Sherwood Content, Jamaica.
Being the fastest man on the planet is clearly good for business and even though it doesn’t look like the 30-year-old will see another Olympic Games, he looks set for life.
