Olatoye, Onyekwere claim gold medals in field events at African Athletics Championship in Mauritius

Sade Olatoye won Nigeria’s fourth gold medal at the ongoing African Athletics Championship in Mauritius after a brilliant performance in the women’s Hammer throw event in the Championship.

Olatoye won the Hammer throw event despite stiff competition from Algeria’s Zouina Bouzebra, who was in the lead after the first two attempts before the Nigerian Olatoye launched her projectile to a distance of 63.67m to beat Bouzebra, whose best effort was 63.48m. Rawan Barakat’s effort of 62.67m gave the Egyptian athlete the bronze medal.

Olatoye’s gold was the second in the field events for Team Nigeria at this year’s African Athletics Championship after Chioma Onyekwere defended her discus title for the second successive year.

Onyekwere launched her projectile to a distance of 58.19m to win the gold medal ahead of Cameroonian Nora Atim Monie who managed a respectable 54.44m throw to win silver, and fellow Nigerian Obiageri Amechi who won the bronze with an effort of 54.15m in her first appearance for the country.

Adding these to the two gold medals won by the women’s 4x100m team and Tobi Amusan in the women’s 100m Hurdles, team Nigeria now have four gold medals in total.