May 01, (THEWILL) – The sterling accomplishments of Nigerian track and field stars, Enoch Adegoke and Grace Nwokocha, at international competitions has opened the eyes of budding athletes to the importance of these local meets on their paths to glowing careers in athletics. It was therefore apposite that the two were propped up as exemplary athletes for the class of competitors desiring to represent the country at this year’s African Senior Athletics Championships scheduled to take place in Mauritius between June 8 and 12, 2022.
In a bid to encourage passionate dedication to exceling at the qualifying series for the African competition, the Secretary-General of the Athletics Federation of Nigeria, Adisa Adeniyi Beyioku, drew the attention of invitees for the second All Comers competition of the year, from where the Nigerian contingent to Mauritius will be selected, to the remarkable feats Adegoke and Nwokocha have achieved for themselves and their country.
Like these hopefuls, Adegoke and Nwokocha started at local competitions. Adegoke won the 100m at the Nigerian Commonweath Games trials in a personal best time of 10.31s before he became part of a Nigerian team that qualified for the final of the 4x100m relay at the 2018 Commonwealth Games, but failed to finish and were eventually disqualified for dropping the baton in the exchange. The Nigerian team came back from that disappointment at the 2018 African Championships and, with Adegoke contributing, went on to win a silver medal in the event.
Adegoke was also billed to represent Nigeria at the 2018 World Under-20 Athletics Championships, but visa processing bottlenecks prevented Team Nigeria from participating at the event. After humble beginnings at the local stage, he has represented Nigeria at the continental level and capped his meteoric rise when he donned the country’s colours at the Summer Games in Tokyo, Japan. Adegoke set a personal best of 9.98 seconds in his 100m heat in Tokyo, making him the 11th Nigerian to breach the 10-second barrier. He advanced to the final after finishing second in his semi-final heat with a time of 10.00s, only to suffer an apparent hamstring injury and was unable to finish the race.
While Adegoke is the current fastest man in Nigeria, which he earned after beating the likes of Usheoritse Itsekiri and Jerry Jakpa to claim the feat at the 2021 National Olympic Games Trials at the Yaba College of Technology Sports Complex in Lagos, his ascent is mirrored in the rise of fellow athlete and Nigerian female sprinter Nwokocha. The 21-year-old burst into the limelight in Akure in March last year when she dusted the competition to breast the tape at the second All Comers meet, which held at the Federal University of Technology, Akure in a time of 11.23 seconds. Nkwocha has not looked back ever since. She followed that up by finishing in first position at the 20th National Sports Festival, held at the Samuel Ogbemudia Stadium, Benin City; at the Nigerian Trials and at the 3rd MoC Grand Prix both of which held at the Yabatech Sport Complex, Lagos last year. She also finished first at the 2022 Tom Jones Invitational which held at the Percy Beard Track, Gainesville, Florida. Although she ran a personal best of 11.0s at the Tokyo Olympics’ Women’s 100m, she did not make it to the finals.
The achievements of these two track and field athletes have shown that sheer determination and hard work can propel athletes who have the zeal to excel, from local competitions to the grandest stages of sporting experience. Both of them, like many of their predecessors before them, took off from humble beginnings at local tournaments and rode their chances to represent Nigeria at the Olympics. They are present examples of the type of athletes the AFN President, Tonobok Okowa, believes should emerge from the ongoing All Comers competition at the Yaba College of Technology. Okowa insists that the Federation is interested in athletes with the hunger for excellence, who  are prospects for podium finishes. These category of athletes are, according to Okowa, the candidates that will be picked from among the best of those congregating at the Yaba College for the competition in Mauritius.
As is the tradition, the two-day All Comers event serves as selection trials for home-based athletes that will fly Team Nigeria’s flag to Mauritius in June. Ahead of the commencement of the competition, the AFN released a programme of events that outlined the competitions that will be contested and the days for each event.
The opening day, Thursday, began with the 10,000 Race Walk final for women, which was followed by the 10,000 Race walk final for the men. After these, the women’s discus final, men’s high jump final and the men and women’s 1,500m final followed respectively. Still on Thursday, the heat for men and women’s 100m, high jump for women, 100m hurdles (women), 110m hurdles (men) 400m for men and women, as well as hammer throw final for men and women wrapped up the morning session of events for the opening day. In the afternoon session, the final of the long jump event (men), javelin (women), 400m hurdles (women), shot put (men), 400m hurdles (men), 100m women final B, 100m women final A, 100m men final B, 100m men final A and the long jump women’s final took place.
These were followed by Friday’s cast of events. It began with the 10,000m final for men, shot put final (women), triple jump final for men, javelin (men), 400m final (men and women), 200m final (men and women), 4x100m final (men and women) and 4x400m mixed final. These events ensured that the AFN had a contingent of athletes to feature for Nigeria at these events for which they had contested and proved themselves capable. It also meant that these athletes achieved the required qualification standard before the window to qualify closed on April 30. This point was highlighted by Samuel Onikeku, the AFN Technical Director, who was proud to reveal that the bulk of the team that will fly Team Nigeria’s flag in Mauritius would be home-based athletes. With the contingent in place, the responsibility of the Federation will be to provide them with the technical and material resources to best prepare their minds, psyche and bodies for the challenge that will be posed by athletes from other countries that are also being prepared for Mauritius. The desire of the AFN President to only select the best must be matched by providing them with the best that money can buy to ensure that they perfect their acts and deliver medals at Mauritius and beyond.
As for the Senior Athletics Championships, the track and field events in Mauritius will be the 22nd edition of the competition organised by the Confederation of African Athletics (CAA). After the 21st edition wrapped up in Asaba, Nigeria, the 22nd was due to be hosted at the Stade Olympique d’Oran in Algeria in 2020 before it was postponed to 2021 and then outrightly cancelled because of the COVID-19 pandemic. Mauritius then picked up the hosting rights and the competition was postponed to this year. It will now hold at Mauritius’ brand new Côte d’Or National Sports Complex, considered to be one of Africa’s most ultramodern sports arenas. It comprises four state-of-the-art facilities: a gymnasium, an aquatic center, a football stadium and an athletics track with a capacity of 15,000 spectators. Spread across 19 hectares and inaugurated on 15 July 2019, the sports complex is the largest and fully integrated sports and entertainment hub in the Indian Ocean and in the African region.
About 48 out of 55 African countries have confirmed their participation at the June championships, so far. There will be no fewer than 45 events on the programme: 22 for Men and 22 for women and one mixed event, including a 10km Trail Race for both men and women. The events for men include: hurdles, decathlon, high jump, pole vault, long jump, triple jump, shot put, hammer, and javelin. Those for women are hurdles, heptathlon, high jump, pole vault, long jump, triple jump, shot put, discus, hammer, and javelin. In 2018, when Nigeria hosted the last edition of the African Senior Athletics Championships in Asaba, Delta State, the country finished third on the medals table with nine gold, five silver and six bronze medals. Kenya won the competition with 11 gold, six silver and two bronze medals while South Africa was second with nine gold, 14 silver and eight bronze medals. It is hoped that Nigeria will perform better this year as the country prepares athletes that will continue to bring glory to Nigeria and write their names in gold.
Jude Obafemi is a versatile senior Correspondent at THEWILL Newspapers, excelling in sourcing, researching, and delivering sports news stories for both print and digital publications.
