Nigerian Sprinters

[Pierre-Jean]

Another question for those in-the-know:

Does Nigeria "import" athletes from neighboring countries, a la Qatar? This would go a long ways toward explaining the disparity, particularly if the athletes change their nationality.

Never heard of such imports. However, sub10 Nigerian sprinters come from various ethnies :
9.85 Fasuba : Yoruba + Jamaica ( half import indeed ! )
9.86 Obikwelu : Ibo (now running for Portugal)
9.92 Ogunkoya : Yoruba
9.94 Ezinwa : Ibo
9.95 Adeniken : Yoruba
9.95 Aliu : Edo + Yoruba
9.97 Emedolu : Ibo
9.98 Effiong : Calabar
9.99 Francis : Ibo ? (now running for Qatar)

[Half Miler]

Great to hear from someone at the scene...thanks, Pierre-Jean!

Props to AS and dakota for all that data as well. A much clearer picture is emerging.

[cacique]

nigeria does not import athletes; it's a net exporter of them. also quite a few nigerian-americans in the US athletics.

what i always thought interesting was that most nigerian athletes seem to come from the christian south -- very few seem to be muslim (this is based on their names, but then names don't always tell the story). maybe it's a cultural thing. the only "muslim" names i can recall are falilat ogunkoya and fatima yusuf. maybe pierre-jean can elucidate this further.

[Pierre-Jean]

Both are muslim for sure. A lot of sprinters are now in Qatar i guess they are all muslim too?

[tandfman]

The main reason IMO is that Nigeria has somewhat of a track and field culture, schools with grass running tracks, a sizable middle class and some half decent coaches. This was true especially in the 80s but T&F is Nigeria is slowly dying now.

Most African countries have almost no culture for T&F, no tracks , no coaches, as a result , most of the T&F talent falls through the tracks. The lack of coaches, lack of scouting, lack of incentive, sabotage and frustration by the authorities means T&F is not worth pursuing in most cases.

A country like Senegal , DR Congo or Mali even Zim is teeming with talent. Think of Gary Kikaya. Would he have been succesful if he actually grew up in DR Congo ? Most likely not. Yet talents like his abound in DRC and other places.

I used to say during the Past decade that if Jamaica really started utilizing their talent properly they could produce so many world class sprinters. I will say the same about Zim, DRC, especially Nigeria and yes even Kenya is capable of producing a few world class sprinters.

African sprinters usually suffer frustration at the hands of the T&F authorities. Obikwelu would have quit the sport by now if he did not have the option of defecting. I doubt ndure would be running as well as he is now

One of the reasons for the defections is that much greater support is available to top athletes in other countries than in, for instance, Nigeria. Here's an interesting interview with Fasuba, in which he mentions this disparity.

http://allafrica.com/stories/200804080289.html

[cacique]

Africa All-Time lists
Men
100m
1 9.85 1,7 Olusoji A. Fasuba NGR 84 Doha 12.05.2006
2 9.86 -0,4 Frankie Fredericks NAM 67 Lausanne 03.07.1996
[ 9.86 0,6 Francis Obikwelu POR 78 Athinai 22.08.2004]
3 9.92A -0,2 Seun Ogunkoya NGR 77 Johannesburg 11.09.1998
4 9.94 0,2 Davidson Ezinwa NGR 71 Linz 04.07.1994
5 9.95A 1,9 Olapade Adeniken NGR 69 El Paso 16.04.1994
[9.95 0.6 Deji Aliu NGR 75 Abuja 12.10.2003]
6 9.97 1 Francis Obikwelu NGR 78 Lausanne 05.07.2000
[9.97 0.6 Uchenna Emedolu NGR 76 Abuja 12.10.20003]
7 9.98 0,3 Daniel Effiong Philip NGR 72 Stuttgart 15.08.1993
8 9.98 1,6 Leonard Myles-Mills GHA 73 Boise 05.06.1999
[9.99 1.6 Aziz Zakari GHA 76 Athína 14.06.2005]
9 10.00 1 Chidi Imoh NGR 63 Berlin 15.08.1986
[10.00 1.1 Eric Nkansah GHA 74 Nürnberg 13.06.1999]
10 10.01A 1,9 Bode Osagiobare NGR 70 El Paso 16.04.1994
[10.01 1.4 Jaysuma Saidy Ndure NOR 84 Doha 09.05.2008]

damn frankie. he screws up the whole east/west theory thing.

[cacique]

Wow. What's up with Mauritania?

Gotz to be some girl who can jog around the track in less than a minute twenty. :shock:

it's one of the poorest countries in the world. i think finding food for the day is a higher priority for most girls than running around the track under a minute.

[cacique]

Ranking of those countries by size:
Dem Congo 62.63m
Cameroon 18.55m
Burkina Faso 14.78m

So as noted earlier Nigeria should be expected to outperform considerably on a population basis, with really, only the DRC and the other two red countries are the bigger (pun intended) underperformers here...

can't really blame DRC (former zaire) for not producing many more sports stars. it's been suffering from decades of horrible civil war/insurgencies. really horrifying stuff still happening in the east of the country, particularly as it pertains to the women. many times more casualties than darfur in comparison , which gets all the attention.