He ran the joint-third fastest time in 100m history in Lausanne last week – only Usain Bolt has run faster.

“I hope everything goes to plan,” Blake, 22, told the BBC. “I won’t give you a time, I’m a man of surprises.”

Blake, who won silver in both the 100m and 200m at the Olympics, heads a field of 15 gold medallists from London 2012.

But the world champion will not compete against Bolt after the pair decided not to compete against each other for the remainder of the season. Bolt plans to run over 200m at Zurich’s Letzigrund Stadium.

Blake, who entered the season with a 9.82 best from Zurich last year and twice ran 9.75 this year before his 9.69 in Lausanne, will race against Tyson Gay and Ryan Bailey of the United States.

Six-time Olympic champion Bolt, meanwhile, clocked a 19.58 meeting record in Lausanne and will face countrymen Warren Weir, the Olympic bronze medallist over the distance, and Jason Young.

“I’m just going out there to compete,” said Bolt. “It’s the end of the season and I’m not as young as I used to be.

“One thing my coach told me is that if you push your body all year, every year, it will deteriorate quickly so if I take my time, I can make my career last. I will just try to relax and go out there and do my best for my fans.”

Elsewhere, David Rudisha, who smashed the 800m world record in London on his way to gold, will compete in his only post-Olympic outing of the season. Amd the Kenyan, who has not returned home since his triumph, is confident of another fast time.

“I wanted to stay focused because when I go home there will be distractions and celebrations and I might forget my training,” Rudisha told BBC Sport. “So I have stayed in Europe to finish the season and then I will go and celebrate.

“We were happy that everything went as planned [in London]. The weather was beautiful and that was a good thing because sometimes I’m affected with weather when it’s cold and rain.

“I think we are still sticking with our plan and we are looking for another fast race here in Zurich.”

British high jumper Robbie Grabarz arrives in Zurich holding the lead in the Diamond League series. The Olympic bronze medallist, who set a new personal best in Lausanne, goes up against Jesse Williams of the United States and co-bronze medallist Mutaz Essa Barshim of Qatar.

In the women’s events, Shelly-Ann Fraser-Pryce and Carmelita Jeter, who were first and second in the 100m final in London, will renew their rivalry over the same distance in Zurich. The field also includes 200m Olympic champion Allyson Felix and Blessing Okagbare of Nigeria.

In the 400m, the top four finishers from London will compete with gold medallist Sanya Richards-Ross lining up alongside silver medallist Christine Ohuruogu and bronze medallist DeeDee Trotter as well as Olympic 400m hurdles champion Natalya Antyukh.

Yohan Blake, Olympic silver medalist in the 100 and 200 metres, beat his previous best by 0.06 seconds as he destroyed a world-class field in the 100 metres American Tyson Gay and fellow Jamaican Nesta Carter were left trailing in his wake.

Blake was congratulated by training partner and friend Usain Bolt, the other man to run below 9.70  with 9.63 recently in the London Olympic Games and the world record of 9.58 in Berlin, 2009.

Olympic Champion Usain Bolt then went out and ran 19.58 seconds for victory in the 200 metres, predictably dominating his race ahead of Dutchman Churandy Martina and Nickel Ashmeade as the top three all finished in under 20 seconds.

Talk immediately turned to the Brit stepping up to road racing after securing double gold at the Olympics earlier this month.

He also doubled up for 5,000m and 10,000m gold at the European Championships two years ago and narrowly missed out on a repeat at the Worlds last year.

And now the 29-year-old is eyeing the Commonwealth Games in Glasgow in two years’ time as his next major goal.

“I’ve still got a long way to go, there are always more things to achieve and when everything’s going well, it’s good to get as many gold medals as you can,” he said.

“I feel like I would like to carry on on the track and then after that go on the road. I’ve never won a title at a Commonwealth Games so it would be good to have another win.

“You can’t have too many medals, you’ve got to take what you can.”

Farah explained the marathon is definitely in his plans although he has not made his mind up as to when he will make the transition.

“It’s definitely true, I’ll definitely be stepping up to the marathon at some point but I’ve not decided when yet,” he added. “We’ll just have to wait and see what the coach says – he hasn’t said much.

“He’s said to take it one race at a time, see how it goes, see how we recover and then go into next year. “I’m always wanting to try new events and test myself to see what I can do.”

But he said nothing will ever compare to winning two gold medals at your home Olympics.

“To have the Olympics in your hometown was the dream,” he said. “It’s exciting, being a London man and growing up here and winning two gold medals at the Olympics means a lot.

“There’s nothing out there that means more than an Olympic medal unless I can became an Olympic champion at a different event.”

Samantha Murray finished second to pick up the silver medal and maintain Great Britain’s record of having won a Modern Pentathlon medal at every Games since the women’s event was introduced to the programme in Sydney 2000.

Brazil’s Yane Marques held on to claim the bronze medal.

Asadauskaite said afterwards: ‘I am immensely excited. I had a great deal of support from the people of Lithuania. It is only a small country, so this means the world to them.

‘I felt very excited and emotional when the crowd cheered for me at the end of the event. But I think they were also cheering for all the other athletes.’

Seven days after claiming Britain’s third gold in the space of 45 minutes on ‘Super Saturday’ in the longer distance, Farah produced another brilliant performance to send the Olympic Stadium into wild scenes of celebration once again.

Roared on by a capacity 80,000-strong crowd, the 29-year-old hit the front with 700m remaining and was never headed, covering the last lap in under 53 seconds to hold off Ethiopia’s Dejen Gebremeskel to win in 13 minutes and 41.66 seconds. Thomas Longosiwa of Kenya claimed bronze.

Farah therefore added his name to the illustrious group of men who had previously taken the 5,000m and 10,000m titles at the same Games – Hannes Kolehmainen of Finland in 1912, Emil Zatopek of Czechoslovakia in 1952, Vladimir Kuts of the USSR in 1956, Finland’s Lasse Viren in 1972 and 1976, Miruts Yifter of Ethiopia in 1980 and countryman Kenenisa Bekele at Beijing four years ago.

His victory also meant Britain have won four track and field golds for only the third time since the Second World War, matching the haul from Tokyo in 1964 and Moscow in 1980, although with six in total, they have fallen short of the target of eight medals set by UK Athletics head coach Charles van Commenee.

Delighted

“It’s an unbelievable feeling, the best feeling ever,” said Farah.

His wife Tania is pregnant with twins, due imminently, and Farah added: “Those two medals are to my two girls that are coming. They’re twins so there’s one for each. They could arrive any day.

“I just want to thank everyone who’s supported me. All my coaches from previous years and all the people who’ve been involved in my life. I can’t thank everybody enough. I want to say particularly to my wife, with her carrying twins, it hasn’t been easy but I didn’t want to know about it.

“If anything happens she promised she wouldn’t let me know so I’m glad it all worked out well. I’m just amazed. Two gold medals – who would have thought that? I never thought coming to London I’d be double Olympic champion.

“It’s been a long journey, grafting and grafting, but anything is possible.”

Farah also won the double at the European Championships in Barcelona in 2010, but still opted to move his family to Oregon the following year to train full-time with former New York Marathon winner Alberto Salazar.

“I’m glad it paid off, when I was moving to America people were saying everything’s going so well why do you need to do that, but as an athlete you sometimes have to make choices and I’m glad I got the right choice,” he added.
Battle

Farah had looked understandably tired in the heats on Wednesday, after which Gebremeskel acknowledged that running a fast race might be the only way to deny Farah victory.

However, if that was the plan it was curiously ignored as the 15-strong field set out at an incredibly slow pace – with more than one lap taking 73 seconds – 20 more than Farah’s closing lap to win the 10,000m.

It took until the midway point of the race for the pace to be wound up but Farah was able to respond and move up to second behind Gebremeskel with three laps to go.

With 700m remaining the 29-year-old hit the front and still led at the bell, at which point he crucially refused to give up his prime position on the inside and accelerated again to stay ahead of the pack.

Gebremeskel, the fastest man in the world this year, briefly closed on Farah down the home straight, but the home favourite was not to be denied a fabulous triumph – and even had the energy to celebrate with a few sit-ups on the track.

The sprint superstar made it a hat-trick of Olympic titles for the second successive Games as he led his team-mates home before seemingly paying his own tribute to double Olympic champion Mo Farah by performing the ‘Mobot’ celebration after crossing the line.

Nesta Carter, Michael Frater and then double silver medallist Yohan Blake gave Bolt the lead he scarcely needed to hold off the United States in second.

Canada thought they had claimed bronze but were disqualified after Jared Connaughton ran outside his lane on the third leg, leaving Trinidad and Tobago to finish third.

Treble treble?

Bolt was asked if he could do the ‘treble-treble’ by winning the 100m, 200m and 4x100m again in four years’ time, having achieved the feat first in Beijing and now in London.

He is not convinced it is possible.

Bolt said on BBC1: “I’ve thought about it but I think it’s going to be very hard because Yohan, he’s just come into the game and he’s running pretty well, and I’m sure there’s going to be a lot more cats coming up to run.

“I’m just happy. I’ll take it a step at a time.”

Asked whether he would run more often in Britain if tax laws change – a factor in him having stayed away in the past – Bolt said: “As soon as the law changes I’ll be here all the time.

“I love being here, I have so many Jamaican fans here and it’s wonderful.”

States success

In the women’s 4x400m relay, the United States stormed to a predictable and emphatic victory.

The quartet of DeeDee Trotter, Allyson Felix, Francena McCorory and Sanya Richards-Ross led from start to finish to beat Russia by almost three and a half seconds.

Jamaica claimed the bronze medal with Britain in fifth behind Ukraine.

Individual silver medallist Christine Ohuruogu was on the final leg for Britain but was left with too much to do by Shana Cox, Lee McConnell and hurdles specialist Perri Shakes-Drayton.

Ohuruogu said: “It would have been nice to come home for the medal, especially for the guys who didn’t really perform how they watned to perform in their events, but it wasn’t to be today.

“I knew it was going to be hard, I was trying to run and catch the Ukrainian, but in front of the Ukrainian was someone else so it was hard.”

Shakes-Drayton, who just missed out on a place in the 400m hurdles final, added: “Today we would have loved to have got a medal, but it didn’t go our way. But as a whole, as a team, we’ve done very well. We’ve run a season’s best (3:24.76), that’s the best we’ve ever run together.

“I had unfinished business to do considering what happened in my own event so I went out there and gave it all I could do.”

The team of Tianna Madison, Allyson Felix, Bianca Knight and Carmelita Jeter raced away from their closest challengers Jamaica to take gold in a time of 40.82.

Felix said: ‘It’s an honour to be part of this team. Who would have thought that we would have had a world record tonight? It’s amazing. Our names are going down in history.’

The Jamaicans ran a national record of 41.41, but still finished well adrift, while Ukraine took the bronze.

The 23-year-old Kenyan stormed to victory in his debut Olympic final to become the first man inside one minute 41 seconds, clocking 1:40.91.

Botswana 18-year-old Nijel Amos took silver, with another teenager, Kenya’s Timothy Kitum, in bronze.

Britain’s Andrew Osagie was in eighth place but still recorded a personal best of 1:43.77.

Reigning world champion Rudisha led from the off, running an opening lap of 49.28 seconds and storming further clear down the back straight to beat his own world record.

With the rest of the field dragged along by his pace, only Abukaker Kaki in seventh failed to record a personal best.

Rudisha told to sport media,  “Wow! I’m very happy. This is the moment I have been waiting for for a very long time. To come here and to break the world record is something unbelievable.

I was well-prepared and I had no doubt about winning. Today the weather was beautiful and I decided just to go for it.”

But the new world record holder believes he can go even faster.

He said: “After running two rounds before the final I got a little bit tired. I told the physio yesterday that I was feeling sore after the semis, so if I can get fresh then I can still improve on that.”

Earlier on Thursday 2012 chief Lord Coe said Rudisha was “the most impressive track and field athlete at these Games”.

Rudisha said: “Lord Coe is a very good friend of mine and earlier, in February, he took me round this stadium. That was good for me. I wanted to come here and make him proud.”

In Amos and Kitum, 17, the future of the event looks in good hands but whether anyone can get near the dominant Rudisha before the next Games in Rio looks unlikely.

Amos clocked 1:41.73 – the 11th fastest 800m of all time – to become the fourth-fastest man ever over the distance. Only Rudisha, Wilson Kipketer and Seb Coe have run two laps of the track faster.

Rudisha has set the three fastest 800m times of all time and managed six of the fastest eight 800m ever.

His pace was consistent throughout, clocking 23 seconds for the first 200m, 25 for the second, 25 for the third, and 26.1 for the final quarter.

Three agents with players in the deal said the teams are expected to complete the trade on a call with league officials on Friday. As of late Thursday, Magic officials had yet to inform Howard a deal had been consummated.

The Lakers will send All-Star center Andrew Bynum to the Philadelphia 76ers, who also will receive shooting guard Jason Richardson from the Orlando Magic. The Sixers will send guard Andre Iguodala to the Denver Nuggets. The Magic will receive Arron Afflalo, Al Harrington, Nikola Vucevic, rookie swingman Moe Harkless, three first-round draft picks and a 2013 second-round pick from the Nuggets (by way of Golden State). In addition to Howard, the Lakers will also receive Earl Clark and Chris Duhon from the Magic.

Lakers forward Pau Gasol had been in previous scenarios of the trade, but his representatives have since been assured he’s no longer in the deal.

Orlando, Los Angeles and Philadelphia had discussed a three-way deal, but needed a fourth team to take Iguodala and also provide Orlando with the necessary future draft picks, sources said. Denver joined the talks in the past week, sources said.

Howard’s contract ends after this season. He isn’t expected to immediately sign an extension with the Lakers because he can get a longer deal in free agency.

The world’s fastest man, whose imperious performances in London have blown away any doubts that he deserves the unofficial title of greatest ever sprinter, stopped the clock at 19.32 seconds, the joint fourth quickest time ever run.

Bolt holds the world record with an eye-popping 19.19 at the Berlin world championships in 2009.

Yohan Blake, as he did in the 100 behind his friend and training partner, took silver in 19.44 and warren weir completed a Jamaican podium sweep with bronze in 19.84.

All three share the same coach — Glen Mills.