World Athletics U-20 Championships: Ochonogor, Eyakpobeyan Reach Finals
Athlete Pristina Ochonogor gave Team Nigeria a strong start at the 2024 World Athletics Under-20 Championships in Lima, Peru, by qualifying for the women’s long jump final.
On Tuesday, she recorded an impressive jump of 6.28 meters, securing second place in Qualification Group A out of 13 competitors and second overall among 25 jumpers.
Ochonogor, 18, who holds a personal best of 6.79m, will compete in the final on Wednesday evening, with hopes of securing a medal for Nigeria. Her jump in the group of 13 jumpers was impressive enough to place her second overall in the opening round, which had 25 jumpers.
In the 4x400m mixed relay event, Team Nigeria could not advance to the final after failing to make the qualification cut in the Peruvian capital city.
The quartet of Oseiwe Salami, Odot Udo, Gafari Badmus, and Favour Onyah ran a season-best three minutes 25.59 seconds to finish third in heat 2. But they finished behind the two automatic qualifiers in the heat, while their time was not good enough to earn them one of the fastest losers’ tickets for the three heats.
However, Justina Eyakpobeyan qualified for the women’s 100m final after clocking 11.56 seconds in the semi-finals. This was an improvement on her earlier time of 11.61 seconds, which had secured her third place in the opening round.
This had placed her third in heat 2 of the opening round, which still helped her to advance to the semi-finals.
Teammate Chioma Nweke exited the competition after finishing sixth in her heat with a time of 12.24 seconds, while Chidera Ezeakor also crashed out in the men’s 100m, finishing seventh in his heat with 10.92 seconds and Team Nigeria was worse in the men’s 100m, with Chidera Ezeakor finishing seventh in heat 2 with a time of 10.92 secs.
