THE final day of the world relay championships in Gaborone, Botswana, produced yet another mixed day for team Nigeria, with two teams securing tickets for the World Championships to join the 4x100m mixed relay team that qualified on the opening day of the championships.
News Point Nigeria Sport reports that the quartets of Samson Nathaniel, Taiwo Kudoro, Chidi Okezie, and Patience Okon-George ran a season best of 3:12. 88 seconds to finish second in Heat Two of the 4x400m mixed relay repechage to pick one of the two tickets available, with South Africa picking the other ticket, having won the race in 3:12.77 to seal their place at next year’s World Championships.
A member of the team, Thompson-Omokwe, said they proved doubters wrong by picking a ticket without any of the foreign-based athletes.
The women’s 4x100m recovered from a baton mishap on day one to also finish second in Heat Two with all home-based athletes: Rosemary Nwankwo, Jennifer Chukwuka, Maria Thompson-Omokwe, and Miracle Ezechukwu running their best race to clock 42.94secs behind France, who won the heat in 42.92secs.
“I’m super excited with the effort we put in; people were expecting the 10 runners and the USA-based athletes, but we showed that home-based athletes can also put up a good performance if given the opportunity and support.
“We are going to go back home now and correct what we didn’t do, so they should get ready,” said Thompson-Omokwe.
For the 4x100m mixed relay team, the quartets of Favour Ashe, Jennifer Chukwuka Obi, Chidera Ezeakor, and Maria Thompson-Omokwe secured a ticket for the maiden World Ultimate Championships, a new premier three-day event in Budapest, Hungary, from September 11 to 13, 2026, after finishing sixth in the final, in a race won by Jamaica with a new World Record of 39.62 seconds.
They will also go home with $6,000.
However, the Men’s 4x400m team of Favour Ashe, James Taiwo, Tejiri Godwin, and Chidera Ezeakor finished third in their repechage heat with a time of 38.50s, but inconsistent exchanges limited their chances of progression, while the 4x400m men also came third to narrowly miss out.
The quartets of Gafar Badmus, Emmanuel Ojeli, Victor Sampson, and Ezekiel Asuquo ran 3:01.43 despite a strong anchor leg from Asuquo, as Senegal won the heat in 3:01.28.
The team for the 4x400m women was not complete to run the race, and they were recorded as DNS.
Team USA men’s 4x100m quartets: Ronnie Baker, Max Thomas, Lax Lang, and Pjai Austin won gold.
