Winning two GOLD medals and a Silver at his first career conference meet, the 2016 Summit League Indoor Championships, created a perfect start to the season for Nigeria’s Omeiza Akerele.
Akerele, a Sophomore at Oral Roberts University, placed 2nd in the 60m in 6.81s; he qualified for the final by running the third fastest time of the day at 6.88s. He went on to inspire a 1-2-3-4 for his school in the 200m, taking the lead in 21.75s ahead of his team mates.
He thereafter teamed up with D’Khari Hicks, Reinhard Ndlovu and Israel Nelson to snatch victory for the Golden Eagles in the 4x400m, posting 3:16.17s to finish ahead of their opponents.
The African Junior Championships Bronze medallist believes that his performance at the meet will serve as much-needed preparation for the outdoor season.
He said, “The indoor season is about getting more competitive speed for the outdoors. I’m a first semester sophomore so this was my first indoor season, but I’m going into my second outdoor season.
“The 6.81s in the 60m and my times in the 200m and 4x400m tell me I’m on the right track for the rest of the season. I didn’t make it to the nationals so I have some time to put some quality training in before the outdoors start.”
Akerele is known to compete in the 400m. However, he only ran the shorter sprints at the championships, except for the 4x400m. He gives Making of Champions his reasons for taking this approach:
“From the beginning of the year, coach and I decided we’ll approach the season this way – 60m, 200m, 4x400m. For the conference I needed to help the team score points in the 60m because we had two other guys that were going to do a decent job in the 400m.
“Also, I figured there would be a lot of 400m outdoors so I may as well use the shorter distance as a platform. It’s a long season ahead of me and I’m looking forward to it.
“By the grace of God, if I stay healthy, a lot of good things are coming. It was a good indoor season for me for so many reasons and I learned a lot from it, although I didn’t get the times I wanted.”
Akerele also dreams of competing in Nigeria’s green and white colours at the forthcoming Rio Olympics and says he hopes to meet the qualifying standard soon.
“I would love to make the international team for Nigeria as many times as possible, and do well of course. Hopefully, I will run the Olympics standard before the National Trials because I plan to be present one hundred percent”, he said.
