1) Uhunoma Naomi Osazuwa:
She has to be the No.1 ranked Nigerian athlete this year, no doubt about it. The fact that she set another National Record (NR) sees her topping the food chain, making a strong case for her candidature there.
Having taken a brief hiatus to complete her education and become a certified Pharmacist, Osazuwa stormed back to reckoning at the Warri National Trials where she surpassed her previous NR in the Heptathlon, and went on to set a new one of 6106 points, going on to win the National title.
At the World Championships, she finished a respectable 18th out of 32 athletes that competed in the grueling seven-sport event with a mark of 5951 points. Though she didn’t match her NR, she improved in some of her events, running a PB in the 800m with a time of 2:21.36 and overcoming a slow start that she had in the 100m hurdles and still finished in the top 20.
Currently ranked 35th, she is the highest ranked African on the IAAF 2015 Top list, and has shown that she didn’t lose touch of Heptathlon in the last two years that she was studying.
The global stage might be tougher but on the continent she stands tall. Osazuwa is an African Games Silver medallist in the High Jump (2011), and she has gone a step higher adding GOLD this September in Congo Brazzaville. She needed another PB of 2:20.12 in the 800m, her final event to eclipse Benin’s Odile Ahouanwanou who settled for Silver.
So, having seen our Top 12 athletes chosen after a rigorous selective process by our in-house jury, arguing in favour or against, do you agree with us?
