London 2012 Olympics: Tyson Gay says 100m is wide open after taking victory in Paris Although Gay, whose personal best of 9.69sec is second only to Bolt's world record of 9.58, recorded a good reaction time in Paris Friday's race, he began slowly in the opening 15 metres to give Gatlin and France's Christophe Lemaitre a headstart. However, the American proceeded to reel the duo in and eventually beat Gatlin by four-hundredths of a second. "I tried to be patient," Gay said. I'm strong mentally and ready for challenges. Trials was a faster race but here a better one for me technically. Having undergone surgery on a hip injury, Gay says his confidence is now growing. "I feel pretty good, considering I came back and made the team," he said. I was under a lot of stress, mentally and physically, early in the season, but I feel a lot better now. A first defeat of the season has done nothing to dent Gatlin's ever-high confidence levels though with the former drugs cheat targeting top spot in London. "I won the gold in Athens and the same thing should happen in London," he said. Obviously the trials were better because I won. I also had some jet lag. Lemaitre, 22, was racing on home turf having sealed his second European 100m title in Helsinki in June. The French 100m record holder again showed that he could be in the running to upset a US-Caribbean sweep of the sprint podiums at the Olympics, as he did in last year's World Championships when he claimed a surprise 200m bronze. "I'm pleased with placing third," he said of his 10.08sec performance. Third behind such top runners is good. Also I reduced the gap between me and the two Americans. I'm now really close to them. But I missed my start. I got out of the blocks behind everyone. Even I saw it. I was able to close the gap on the others, but the bad start killed me. There is still some work left to do.