Nigeria’s Blessing Okagbare will be competing in a stacked women’s 200m semifinal on Tuesday at the ongoing Rio 2016 Olympics.
Okagbare won her preliminary heat in 22.71s, getting one of the automatic qualification spots with Great Britain’s Dina Asher Smith finishing 2nd in the race with a time of 22.77s
However Okagbare will have to be at her very best in the semis if she is to make the final on Wednesday, as she will be coming up against 2015 World Champion Dafne Schippers, and newly crowned 100m Olympic champion, Elaine Thompson, all in heat 1 with her.
There are also Asher-Smith, America’s Deejah Stevens to consider who would equally be vying for the top two spots that guarantee automatic qualifications to the final.
The favourites to take the two automatic spots are Schippers and Thompson who both clocked 21.63s and 21.66s to win GOLD and Silver respectively at last year’s World Championships in Beijing.
Okagbare missed out on qualifying for the 100m final last Saturday, no doubt she will be eager to make the final in the 200m, but she might have to run faster than her Personal Best of 22.23s to be able to do so.
