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INCREDIBLE: Three Nigerians are the fastest runners in Europe, Asia and Africa (photos)
Jamaican sprinter Usain Bolt on Sunday night in far away Rio de Janeiro in Brazil won the 100m in 9.81sec to capture an unprecedented third consecutive 100m gold medal at the Olympics.
American rival Justin Gatlin took silver with Andre De Grasse of Canada claiming bronze.
No Nigerian male athlete made it to the final race not to talk of making the podium.
This is quite disappointing to many Nigerians considering the fact that athletics used to be one of Nigeria’s favourite events at the Olympics.
What makes it more unsatisfactory is when one realizes that three different Nigerian-born track champions are currently the fastest men for Africa, Asia and Europe. Yes, Nigerian-born athletes hold the three records across three continents!
Below are three Nigerian-born athletes representing three different countries in three continents with three fastest records:
-Francis Obikwelu, born in Onitsha on November 22, 1977, is the current European record holder in the 100m. Obikwelu left Nigeria as a teenager and settled in Portugal. He continued to represent Nigeria until 2001. After he suffered a career-threatening injury at the 2000 Sydney Olympics, the Athletics Federation of Nigerian abandoned the star in his hour of need. Not only had he to foot the medical bills himself but he also spent a few months in hospital recuperating after surgery complications led to a blood clot.
A year later he became a naturalized Portuguese citizen. His silver medal performance at the 2004 Athens Olympics was his career best, as he set a European record of 9.86 seconds. The record is still standing.
-Femi Ogunode, born on May 15, 1991 in Ondo State, is Asia’s fastest man. He has said the move to become a Qatari national in 2010 was a calculated risk that paid off. He alleges nepotism and corruption in Nigerian athletics.
Ogunode made his international debut for Qatar at the 2010 Asian Games. But last year, he set a career best of 9.93 seconds at the Asian Games. This April he ran a few seconds faster to set the Asian record of 9.91 seconds at the Asian Athletics Championships.
His younger brother, Tosin Ogunode, is also a sprinter for Qatar. Ogunode’s four brothers all live in Doha, Qatar and his four sisters are married and settled in Nigeria. He has a son named Femi Nathan.
-Olusoji Fasuba, born on July 9, 1984 in Sapele Delta State, is Africa’s fastest man whose 9.85 second record is yet to be broken since 2006.
This was one hundredth of a second better than the old record of 9.86 seconds that was set by Namibian track and field legend Frankie Fredericks a decade earlier.
Fasuba is currently the ninth fastest 100m runner ever with a time below the 10-second mark. He also has the fourth fastest time by an African runner in the 60 metres with 6.49s; only Leonard Myles-Mills, fellow Nigerian Deji Aliu, and Morne Nagel have run faster.
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