Customers wishing to buy crime fiction at the Waterstones store in Piccadilly this afternoon needed to be unusually patient.

One by one they arrived, heading, as perhaps so often before, for the shelves laden with the works of Jeffrey Deaver, Ian Rankin and Patricia Cornwell. One by one their expressions were first bewildered, then thwarted as they were ushered away from the "event" due to take place just behind a stand marked "Blue Murder" - a book signing by the global phenomenon known as Usain Bolt.

It has to be said that even the mention of the world’s fastest man did not instantly disperse the cross looks on some faces. "Looks frightfully complicated," announced one well-spoken mum as she ushered her two young children away from the expectant melee of photographers and TV crews corralled in front of the signing desk, and the phalanx of patient visitors, the most enthusiastic of whom had begun queuing outside the door at 6.30am - five-and-a-half hours before Jamaica’s pride and joy was due to arrive.

"We had some people here before I got here at 7.00am," said one Waterstones employee who had seen ‘em all come and go for book signings over the years: Pele, Bobby Charlton, Lewis Hamilton, Girls Aloud... "This is reaching those numbers," she added.

The first wave of Bolt fans awaited the signal to advance, many of them clutching copies of the book, logically titled "Usain Bolt – My Story", with little yellow post-it notes attached bearing the name which the famed sprinter would be asked to inscribe.

Downstairs, another battalion of Bolt lovers stood ready. Outside, further reinforcements had been marshalled into queues that stretched back down Piccadilly and round the corner into Church Place.

Right at the back of the queue - again, logically - stood the Last Person In The Queue. It was William, all the way from Whitehall. And he knew he was the Last Person In The Queue because the polite store employees had told him so.

William was so far back, he didn’t even have one of the little grey numbered raffle tickets staff had been handing out all morning. A few places in front of him, a Jamaican gent called Sheldon, sporting a nifty Usain Bolt cap in national colours with those twin peaks of world records emblazoned on it - 9.58, 19.19 - produced his ticket, merely out of the goodness of his heart. It was number 218.

Back inside, where the people with the smaller numbers stood, you could have cut the tension with a tension cutter - that’s if you could ever find a tension cutter. Although why are people always so set on cutting tension? Why can’t tension just be left?

Anyway. Faces were straining backwards now, towards the stairs, waiting for their Man.

Terri, a native of Florida who was staying in London on vacation, was one of several in the queue who had seen details about the signing on Bolt’s Facebook site. What a lot of friends this man has.

"I’ve had a quick look through the book already," she said. "It looks a very good read."

June, from Maldon, looked a little preoccupied, but it was fair to assume she was excited inside. "He’s amazing, all the records he sets," she said. Was it the records, or Bolt’s winning personality which had drawn her to Piccadilly on this fine autumnal afternoon?
"It’s both really," she said.

There was a ripple of uncertainty when several men in suits wandered up the stairs very obviously carrying newly bought copies of Tony Blair’s new book - I Was Right - in the manner of self conscious fourth formers who have just discovered Albert Camus or Hunter S Thompson.

Was the former Prime Minister about to stage a rival signing? Well no.

The only other signing due that day, an employee explained patiently, would be at 6.00. Dom Joly.

Barely had that bombshell exploded when the patient hordes had their wish.

The Man was here, loping quietly up the stairs as a very British reserve broke out all around him. Wearing a grey hoodie, with the
legend: Usain Bolt…To Da World - whatever that means - he strode up to the table and produced his trademark Firing The Bow stance for the flickering lightning of the cameras.



When the photo-opportunity had finished, and Bolt was allowed to relax the grin he has grinned all over the world in the last couple of years, he sat down at the desk and began the long business of signing with the care of an eager schoolboy.

Figures knelt before him, bearing mobile phone cameras. The Adoration of the Main Guy.

After they had been ushered to, and then away from, the centre of attention, Catherine and Lizzie were detained by the BBC cameras and asked for their impressions of the sprinter.

They were happy to repeat their views for insidethegames readers.

"He was nice," said Catherine. "He just said 'Have a nice day, hope you didn’t have to wait too long..'"

For these two, Bolt’s autograph completed a set. At last month’s Diamond League meeting in Crystal Palace, they had got the monickers of Linford Christie and the American who proved back in July that the world and Olympic champion was not unbeatable -Tyson Gay.

"Tyson Gay was really charming," Lizzie said. "We thought he might be all moody, but he wasn’t like that at all."

Yasmin Rashid and her friend Raj Patel, two 17-year-old club sprinters from East Grinstead and Crawley respectively, were also pleasantly disposed towards the Signing Man.

"We’ve seen him run at Crystal Palace, but it was weird to meet him," Yasmin said. "He had a very firm handshake," Raj added.

Darna was one of the few present who had met Bolt before - she had ended up sitting near to him last year when she was flying home to London after visiting Jamaica.

"He had some photos taken with me," she recalled. "He’s still in touch with his roots. He’s got time for the people."

As she spoke, Bolt was living up to her words, bent over book number one hundred and whatever with painstaking attention. It was going to be a long session for Usain. A 400 metres of a session…

Back outside, the queue had advanced. But only marginally. William from Whitehall was still there, hoping…

Mike Rowbottom, one of Britain's most talented sportswriters, has covered the last five Summer and four Winter Olympics for The Independent. Previously he has worked for the Daily Mail, The Times, The Observer, the Sunday Correspondent and The Guardian. He is now chief feature writer for insidethegames