African Athletics Championships: Nigeria wins first medal in South Africa

Team Nigeria on Wednesday won her first medal on Day 1 of action at the ongoing 20th African Senior Championships in Durban, South Africa.

Stephen Mozia won the bronze medal in men’s shot put event after throwing a distance of 19.84m to finish behind the duo of Jacobus Engelbrecht (South Africa) who won gold with a throw of 20.00m and Franck Elemba (Democratic Republic of Congo) who snatched silver with his throw of 19.89m.

Having barely made the trip to Durban, owing to paucity of funds, Team Nigeria have an uphill task to upstage hosts, South Africa, who also finished tops in the last edition of the African Championships in Morocco.

South Africa have shown that they mean business, claiming two gold medals already in the first day of action.

The chances for Nigeria is further dampened with the absence of some of her top guns in Durban.

Only Gloria Asumnu made it to the finals of the 100m event for women while Nigeria has no representation in the male version.

South Africa on their part will have three men’s sprinters in the 100m final after national record-holder Akani Simbine, Thando Roto, and junior champion Gift Leotlela made it through the semi-finals.

Simbine coasted through in second place with a time of 10.25s with Roto also finishing his race in second place in 10.28s.

Leotlela also just made it into the final finishing third in his race by photo finish in 10.29s with two more athletes posting the same time.

The five-day Senior Athletics Championships is taking place at Kings Park Athletics Stadium, in Durban, between 22-26 June, 2016.