The duo of Blessing Okagbare and Grace Nwokocha representing Nigeria in the women’s 100m at the Tokyo Olympics have qualified for the semi-finals.
Running in Heat 5 in the 1st Round of the 100m women’s race, Grace Nwokocha ran a personal best time of 11.00 secs to place 3rd in a race easily won by Shelly-Ann Fraser-Pryce of Jamaica with a time of 10.84s.
Heat 6 was won by Blessing Okagbare in 11.05s followed by Philip Asher of Great Britain in a distant 11.31s.
Marie Josee Talou of Cote d’Ivoire returned the best time of round 1 with 10.78 secs which is an African record.
Jamaican Elaine Thompson, the defending champion from the Rio Games, won Heat 2 with a time of 10.82s to set up what is expected to be an all-star semi-final lineup
Elaine Thompson ended fellow Jamaican Shelly-Ann Fraser-Pryce’s bid for Olympic history in 2016 as she took the women’s 100-meter title in Rio.
Thompson won the gold medal in a time of 10.71 seconds, with American Tori Bowie finishing second in 10.83 while Frayser Pryce finished in 3rd place.
The semi-finals of the Tokyo 2020 Olympics 100m women’s race is billed for Saturday morning Nigeria time.
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