Chukwuebuka Enekwechi became Nigeria’s first Track and Field medallist at the 2018 Commonwealth Games after smashing his Personal Best, replacing it with a new lifetime best of 21.14m to win the Silver medal in the men’s Shot put on Monday.
The thrower rose to the occasion in his maiden outing at the Games to finish behind reigning World Indoor and outdoor Champion, Tom Walsh of New Zealand who won the event with 21.41m, while Canada’s Tim Nedow settled for Bronze with a Season’s Best of 20.91m.
Walsh was fouled on three attempts and secured his winning mark in his fourth attempt as he was subsequently shown the red flag on his fifth and sixth attempts. The thrower from New Zealand would have been aiming to improve on his Games Record (GR) of 22.45m set the previous day during the qualifying rounds.
The Commonwealth Games is Enekwechi’s third outing for Nigeria, having competed at the 2017 World Championships, and the 2018 World Indoors in Birmingham where he placed 14th.
The 25-year old enjoyed a brilliant outing in Gold Coast as he commenced his campaign in the final with 20.25m, then improved to 20.70m in his second throw. He earsed is former PB of 21.07m on his third attempt, while his fourth throw landed at 20.40m. He was fouled on his fifth attempt and ended competition with a distance of 20.17m.
Enekwechi also gave a good account of himself during the qualifying rounds the previous day where he secured a throw of 20.66m to finish 2nd behind Walsh in Group A.
Meanwhile Eke Kalu who is also competing in his first international outing for Nigeria, placed 12th with his best throw of 17.86m.
