Tokyo Olympics: Nwokocha Qualifies For Women’s 200m Semi-Finals, While Blessing Oborududu Advances To Wrestling Semi-Finals

Nigeria’s Grace Nwokocha sprinted her way into the semi-finals of the women’s 200m at the ongoing Tokyo Olympics on Monday morning.

Nwokocha ran a personal best of 22.47 seconds to finish third in heat 1 of the event to gain one of the automatic tickets to the semi-finals.

Cote d’Ivoire’s Marie-Josee Ta Lou had won the heat with 22.30, while the Bahamas’ Shaunae Miller-Uibo was second with 22.40.

News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) reports that the 20-year-old Nigerian had reached the semi-finals of the women’s 100m event, where she ran an 11.07 on Sunday.

It had only helped her to place fifth in semi-final 3, a result that was not enough for her to move to the final which was ran later in the day.

However this was after she had ran another personal best 11.00 to place third from heat 5 on Saturday in the event’s round one to progress to the semi-finals.

NAN reports that the women’s 200m semi-finals are due for later on Monday (11:30am Nigerian time), while the final is slated for Tuesday.

Meanwhile, Blessing Oborududu, team Nigeria’s wrestler, beat Elis Manolova of Azerbaijan in the women’s freestyle to qualify for the quarter-finals at Tokyo Olympics.

She won 13-2 against Manolova at the Makuhari Messe hall A. Oborududu will face Meerim Zhumanazarova of Kyrgyzstan next.

Sadly, Nigeria’s hope of getting a medal in the women’s 100m hurdles was dashed as Tobi Amusan finished fourth in the final.

Jasmine Camacho-Quinn of Puerto Rico clinched the gold medal in 12:37 seconds.

Kendra Harrison of USA finished second to win the silver medal in 12:52 seconds while Megan Tapper of Jamaica won the bronze.