Whilst soccer could also be essentially the most adopted game in Nigeria, Athletics stays arguably the most efficient game for the rustic at the international level.
Greater than some other game, our athletes have persistently delivered medals at international occasions just like the Olympic Video games, frequently sparing the country’s blushes at such occasions.
On this article, we relive Nigeria’s biggest monitor and box moments.
5. Males’s 4x400m Bronze (Los Angeles 1984 Olympic Video games)
We commence off with the historical 4×400m group of Los Angeles 1984- the boys who delivered Nigeria’s first athletics medal on the Olympic Video games.
Sunday Uti ran a blistering opening leg for Workforce Nigeria, turning in the baton to Moses Ugbesien, after which Rotimi Peters, earlier than Blameless Egbunike took the group house in 3rd position at the back of the American citizens.
Egbunike in short had 2nd position against the top of the race, however Nigeria was once overtaken by way of the fast-finishing British group because the runners approached the road.
Nonetheless, it was once a very good functionality from Workforce Nigeria, who produced an African report that will no longer be damaged for every other 16 years.
4. Ladies’s 4x100m Bronze (Barcelona 1992 Olympic Video games)
Whilst Egbunike and co. delivered a maiden Athletics medal for Nigeria on the Olympics in 1984, the quartet of Beatrice Utondu, Religion Idehen, Mary Onyali and Charity Opara-Thompson wrote their very own piece of historical past 8 years later in 1992.
They produced an impressive piece of sprinting to assert the bronze medal, changing into the primary Nigerian girls to get a medal of any shape on the Olympic Video games.
France had been marginally forward of Nigeria heading into the overall 100m, however Onyali charged during the ultimate leg to pip the French to the publish, sending the Nigerian quartet into delirium in one of the vital enduring pictures of the Olympic Video games.
3. Males’s 4×400m Gold (Sydney 2000 Olympic Video games)
When Enefiok Udo-Obong took the baton from Sunday Bada for the anchor leg on the 4x400m males’s relay ultimate at Sydney 2000, Workforce Nigeria was once in fourth position and no longer given a lot of a possibility to get a medal.
And whilst American nice Michael Johnson galloped via to victory for america, the actual race was once unfolding at the back of him, with Udo-Obong generating a functionality for the ages to overtake the Jamaican and Bahamian anchors for the silver.
It was once Silver at the evening, however 12 years down the road, the medal was once upgraded to gold after a member of the American quartet admitted to taking functionality improving medication all over that length.
2. Tobi Amusan (100m Hurdles, Global Athletics Championships, Oregon 2022)
Within the lead-up to the 2022 Global Athletics Championships in Oregon, USA, Tobi Amusan were one among Nigeria’s maximum constant athletes; arguably our brightest medal hope on the match.
And she or he delivered in surprising taste in Oregon, blitzing the sector report to develop into Nigeria’s first gold medallist within the historical past of the Global Championships.
Whilst Amusan was once noticed as a real medal prospect, no longer many anticipated her to decimate a top quality box and hurricane to gold. Betking, some of the easiest having a bet websites in Nigeria, gave Amusan large odds of 12 odds to win the sector name!
Amusan smashed the sector report within the semi-finals along with her time of 12.12seconds, earlier than going even sooner within the ultimate, hurtling and hurdling to victory in 12.06 seconds. Sadly, her time within the ultimate wasn’t recognised because it was once produced with an over-the-limit wind at the back of her.
Nonetheless, that took not anything clear of a sensational performance- simply some of the best in Nigeria’s storied athletics historical past.
1. Chioma Ajunwa (Lengthy Bounce, Atlanta 1996 Olympic Video games)
Chioma Ajunwa produced arguably Nigeria’s biggest second in international Athletics when she leapt to Gold within the lengthy leap match of the Atlanta 1996 Olympic Video games.
Within the procedure, she was Nigeria’s first ever Olympic Gold medallist (beating the boys’s U-23 soccer group to the punch!), with a surprising soar of seven.12 seconds.
The extremely multi-talented Ajunwa, who had prior to now represented Nigeria’s Tremendous Falcons on the Ladies’s Soccer Global Cup 1991, will ceaselessly be remembered as one among Nigeria’s and Africa’s biggest Olympians.