Oscar Pistorius puts on his running shoes at Brunel University in London on July 10. The IAAF is wary of Oscar Pistorius' bid to cross over into mainstream athletics, but he says recent tests will show he has every right to be in Beijing next August. [China Daily/The Olympian]

Double amputee Oscar Pistorius wants to sprint against the best, but his Olympic hopes hang in the balance.

The South African hopes to overturn a new regulation by the International Association of Athletics Federations (IAAF) and race the world's fastest men at the 2008 Beijing Games by proving that his immense lower-body strength, and not the revolutionary "Cheetahs" -- his futuristic, J-shaped prosthesis -- give him his remarkable speed.

"I don't see any way that I can't make it to the Beijing Olympics," Pistorius, who turned 21 Thursday, told China Daily by phone. "I'm very optimistic. I'm positive."

Pistorius was born without fibulae, or calf bones, in both legs and had his limbs removed from below the knee when he was 11 months old.

He was speaking fresh off the plane following two days of biomechanical and physiological tests in Germany that the IAAF will use in the coming months to decide his eligibility for the 2008 Olympics.

Perhaps not since Chris Boardman unveiled his ergonomically dazzling Lotus superbike at the Barcelona Games in 1992 has a technical device and its champion sparked such widespread interest.

Then again, controversy is never far from the Olympics. For the 2004 Athens Games, the International Olympic Committee ruled that transsexual athletes could compete without discrimination for the first time, much to the chagrin of some women's groups.

Pistorius' camp could argue this sets a timely precedent, even though it crosses a different line.

"Oscar is the first disabled athlete to be good enough to be ready to cross over into the world of able-bodied athletes," Nick Davies of the IAAF, said.

"Although he is not yet fast enough to qualify by right for the IAAF World Championships or the Olympics, he is certainly not far away and he is still young, so the potential is there."

Pistorius, nicknamed Blade Runner for his bendy, carbon-fiber prosthesis, must convince the IAAF that his Cheetahs do not give him an unfair advantage. He must also beat the clock if he hopes to qualify for his favored Olympic event, the 400m.

"I still have to come down 0.8 seconds," he said.

"I'm training very hard, though, so the opportunity's definitely there."

Some of his supporters believe he will help do for disabled people what Nelson Mandela did for black South Africans.

"The line between abled and differently-abled is going to be wiped out," his father, Henke, told China Daily.

Wang Juan, a Chinese long jump athlete wearing a tailored prosthetic, wins a silver medal at the Athens Paralympics in 2004. Almost all of China's track and field team will wear prosthetics at the Beijing Paralympics next September. [Xinhua]

"There is less than a 5-percent chance the IAAF will be silly enough to rule against Oscar competing in Beijing. If they do that, they will have to allow him for the next two Games just to save face."

When an injury ended Oscar's rugby-playing career in January 2004, Henke drove them both to Pretoria University's High Performance Center to ask a physiologist there if his son could migrate to the world of Paralympics sprinting.

"After doing some tests, he said to Oscar, 'You don't need to do any muscle exercises, you just need to be fit,'" Henke said.

"He used the analogy of the Bulls (the present Southern Hemisphere rugby champions), who were with them the previous week, saying that in relation to Oscar's weight, which was 63 kg at the time, his spine and 'gluts' were stronger than anyone on the Bulls team."

Pistorius is confident he will get to sprint at the Bird's Nest - the centerpiece stadium for the track and field competitions at the Beijing Olympics.

He hits the track at least four times a week but spends more time stretching and working on his gluteus maximus and lower back, the hypertrophied muscle groups that help compensate for his lack of legs, calves and ankles.

Pistorius, a (disabled) world record holder in the 100m, 200m and 400m, came second against able-bodied sprinters in the 400m at this year's national championships in his native South Africa, but has yet to fully prove himself on the world stage despite some notable performances in Europe.

When he finished last at a rain-swept British Grand Prix in Sheffield on July 15 against the world's finest -- he was ultimately disqualified for running out of lane.