Olympic, World and Commonwealth Games medallist, Nigeria’s Blessing Okagbare is among the eight sprinters that will line up in the stellar 100m field at the Wanda Doha Diamond League at the Qatar Sports Club on Friday 28 May.
The race will be the Nigerian’s toughtest test yet as she continues her preparations for the 2020 Tokyo Olympics which is less than a 70 days from today.
Okagbare started the season with new personal bests in the 60m event (7.10 seconds) she last ran in 2010 as a collegiate athlete and the 200m event (23.01 seconds) during the indoor season.
Outdoors the long legged and beautiful Nigerian also started on a personal best setting note, running an impressive 53.21 seconds over the full lap race.
In the 200m she ran a wind-aided 22.03 seconds while in the 100m she clocked a 10.97 personal season’s best, so far.
This will be Okagbare’s fourth trip to Doha to run the 100m. On her debut in the event in Doha, she ran 11.01 seconds to place fourth behind the trio of Allyson Felix of the USA (10.92) and the Jamaican duo of Veronica Campbell-Brown (10.94) and Fraser-Pryce (11.00).
The Nigerian retuned two years later to run 11.18 to place second behind Fraser Pryce while in 2018 she raced inside 11 seconds for the first time in Doha, stopping the clock at 10.90 to place second behind Marie Jose Ta Lou (10.85). The time was Okagbare’s personal season’s best that year.
This year, the Moscow 2013 World Championship double medallist will probably need to run her fastest time ever as she confronts athletes she will definitely meet in Tokyo at the Olympics with USA’s Sha’Carri Richardson heading the incredible 100m field.
Richardson is the fastest woman in the world this year. The 21-year-old clocked a stunning 10.72 lifetime best at the Miramar Invitational in Florida in April to go sixth on the world all-time list.
She backed that up with another two sub-10.80 performances – 10.74 in the heat and 10.77 into a headwind in the final – at the USATF Golden Games held at Mt SAC in Walnut, California, on Sunday 9 May.
The 100m field will also feature the Jamaican duo of double Olympic champion Elaine Thompson-Herah and defending world champion Shelly-Ann Fraser-Pryce.
The duo have six Diamond Trophies between them, but they, like Okagbare will have their work cut out at the second Wanda Diamond League meeting of the season in Doha when they take on rising star Richardson.
Thompson-Herah is also in fine form and ran 10.78 to win the Pure Athletics Sprint Elite Meet earlier this month after a windy 10.76 in her heat. A gold medallist over 100m and 200m in Rio 2016, she is ranked fourth-equal in the world all-time rankings (10.70) alongside Fraser-Pryce, double Olympic champion (2008 and 2012) and multiple world champion over 100m, 200m and 4 x 100m relay.