Athletics
WORLD RECORD HOLDER, YOUNG RELISHING CURRENT ‘HISTORIC MOMENT’ IN 400M HURDLES
As Kevin Young prepares to watch the men’s 400m hurdles final this Monday night, he does so knowing that his days as the world record holder in the event are numbered. And after carrying that honour for more than 27 years, he’s excited about the prospect.
“Never in the history of the event have there been
three hurdlers at one time who have all run under 47.2,” Young said on the
morning of Zurich’s IAAF Diamond League final last month.
He didn’t know then that less than 12 hours later his point would be underscored by Karsten Warholm and Rai Benjamin after they joined Abderrahman Samba as members of the sub-47 club after one of the season’s most spectacular showdowns.
Warholm defeated Benjamin by 0.06 in 46.92 in a race that doubled to four the number of hurdlers who have smashed through the 47-second barrier. Three will be lining up in Khalifa Stadium in tomorrow night’s final.
“That’s the story,” Young said. “You have three hurdlers who haven’t reached their pinnacle. That’s the beauty of this event right now.”
Indeed, Young points out, the only component that’s missing for the youthful trio — Benjamin is 22, Warholm 23 and Samba just turned 24– is experience.
“They are all young hurdlers. And hurdling is a discipline which you develop over time. You get comfortable with the race. And you get comfortable with how you run the race. It’s discipline and strategy.”
Young said he spent much of his early career experimenting with a variety of approaches, running 13 strides between hurdles, sometimes 12, sometimes even 11. He studied Edwin Moses, whom he refers to as “the master” and a “well-oiled machine”.
“For many years I tried going 13 steps, and floundered. I tried it during the national championships in 1986 and ended up going 11 steps at one of the hurdles. All through my last collegiate season I was going 12 steps and chopping and trying to figure the race out. I just couldn’t get it together. But then I finally did.”
Young was 25 when he sped a seemingly impossible 46.78 to secure the 1992 Olympic gold medal, and his place in athletics’ history. He smashed the previous world record, Moses’ fourth by a massive 0.24 seconds. That could only come, he said, after a long period of studying the discipline, learning how to race the event and gaining experience.
“I was talking with Rai (Benjamin) and Karston (Warholm) and I asked, ‘how old are you guys? And they’re 22, 23 years old. I think, ‘Wow! Man!’ You guys are still developing, you guys will probably break it a few times.”
The world record’s ‘X factor’, as Young calls it, lies in the hurdler’s ability to control their speed.
“When I broke the world record I ran six seconds to the first hurdle. Between 5.8 and six seconds. I think it’s six seconds. Rai told me it was 5.8 seconds. And I asked him, ‘How fast are you getting to the first hurdle?’ He said 5.5. And I said, ‘You guys are running too damned fast.’ ”
“That is the holy grail of the event. It’s called speed maintenance. I know personally, when you get to that 200-metre phase you start opening up and you want to run fast. It’s the natural thing to do coming off that turn. But that’s when you want to be mindful and monitor your speed.”
That’s showing in the latter phases of the current big three’s races.
“They’re going 13 (steps) at least to (hurdle) nine. But they haven’t been able to negotiate that last hurdle. With fatigue and great competitors, that’s going to happen.”
His advice on how to correct that? Take full advantage of this historical moment in time and race each other. Often.
“If I was Samba, and Rai and Warholm, I would constantly want to race with one another. Just so we could see who would be first to break the record. And secondly, then let’s see who can break it a little bit more. Edwin (Moses) held the record from 1976 to 1992. And broke it several times in between. Can you imagine with the three guys now? We have that luxury.
“It’s just a matter of date and time,” he concludes. “You’ve got to get competitors to line up. You never know what’s going to happen once you get guys out there and running.”
Young has remained a hardcore fan of the sport, lean and athletic at 53. At the moment, his focus has shifted towards his Master’s studies in Sports and Ethics, which he began this month at Swansea University in Wales.
But this week, his eyes will be even more closely trained on what many consider the premiere event at this year’s World Championships, and the world record possibilities the race presents. He seems content, happy even, with those possibilities.
“I’ve seen that record get broken a few times in my head – thank god it hasn’t gotten broken yet! And when it is, I’ll look at the time in which I’ve held the world record, and I’m comfortable with the time period.”
Bob Ramsak for the IAAF
BY DANLADI BAKO
Sports and indeed global athletics have been the cynosure of quite a huge community of track and field afficionados in the last nine days at the Tokyo World Athletics finals.
The global athletics fraternity congregates annually to celebrate new world beaters and champions.
Athletes spend a large amount of time, energy and resources to train, attracting the best coaches and utilizing some of the high impact facilities in developing qualifying times for their individual events.
So many nations facilitate the upscaling and upgrading of their athletes’ mentality, physique and performance standing through investments in the training and welfare of their high-profile athletes by providing grants, scholarships and appreciable reward systems.
These have been in short supply in Nigeria and indeed within the developing world where the priorities of most governments are education, health, poverty and so many other development challenges.
However, the benefits of investing in sports are unquantifiable especially on the world global diplomatic stage, unassailable visibility and an incredible reputation unachievable in so many other areas of human existence. In the eighties and 90s the Americans literally ruled the sprints with female 100 meters legend Florence Griffiths – Joyner and 400 meters world champion Michael Johnson.
Just like America used the movies to show Americans as the world best, sportsmen like basketball’s Michael Jordan and boxing’s Muhammad Ali put America on the pinnacle of human capacity for endurance, determination, strategic planning and near perfect execution.
America might have the size and population above 200 million so it’s success can be expected, however Jamaica an island of 150 miles by 50 miles has gone beyond exporting Reggae’s global icons like Bob Marley and Alton Ellis to producing 100 meters legends Usain Bolt, Sherry Ann Fraser-Price and Marlene Ottey thereby winning international recognition and inevitable public reckoning far beyond most African countries.
Now a land locked southern African sub-continent country Botswana with less than the population of Lagos State just on Sunday won the 4 x 400 men’s relay gold at the Tokyo 2025 games even after picking a few other medals through individual athletes Tebogo et al.
The Tokyo games have come and gone with Tobi Amusan putting Nigeria on the medals table with her 100 meters Silver medal. Ajayi’s efforts in the 100 meters men’s final was also commendable.
For me the highest point was the super- human diminutive Kenyan Faith Kipyegon in the 1500 metres clinching gold and 5000 metres silver.
Another great spectacle was the exploits of American idol Noah Lyle who anchored the last leg of the 4 x100 metres gold winning quartet.
Lyle won the 200 metres gold as well becoming one of the audaciuos and eye-catching supreme athletes of Tokyo 2025. Mention must be made of Sweden’s Armand Mondo who broke the pole vault world record thrice in two days.
So when and how would Nigeria get to these towering heights of conquering the world?
The fact is that we once had Olympic and World Athletics finalists like Innocent Egbunike (400m) , Chidi Imo (100 and 200m), Yusuf Alli (Long jump) and Falilat Ogunkoya (400m) although it was the American University collegiate structure that groomed them to become world beaters with little or no input from the home government.
Once in a long while a training grant of $50,000 gets handed to them in preparation for Olympic games to pay their coaches and for utilizing training facilities abroad. Even Ezekiel Nathaniel and Oyinkansola Ajayi are still beneficiaries of the American University collegiate structure.
The aforementioned names who also schooled and trained in the United States are still very much around especially Yusuf Alli, Falilat and Mary Onyali.
The authorities need to device the appropriate strategies to achieve podium standings in the nearest immediate future.
All the products of the National Youth Games and the School Sports Federation games should be drafted into a growth enhancement program, hire some of the best Athletics coaches from around the world and ensure the construction and maintenance of high-performance pitches and gymnasia.
The Sports Federations must be populated with patriotic and passionate sports men who are brimming with enthusiasm, desire and creativity.
President Tinubu did not only resuscitate the National Sports Commission, he gave an unprecedented 12 billion naira to the Sports Ministry for AFCON and other tournaments earlier this year so we have a listening President who can restore our lost glory in sports and athletics in particular. Nigeria must reclaim its podium standing capability as soon as possible.
Danladi Bako, OON was Senior Special Assistant to former Minister of Youth and Sports as well as one-time Chairman Sokoto State Football Association.
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By KUNLE SOLAJA.
Nigeria’s silver medal finish at the Tokyo 2025 World Athletics Championships once again highlighted the country’s roller-coaster fortunes on the global stage.
While the podium placement ensured Nigeria did not return empty-handed, the overall medal count has remained stagnant in recent years compared to other rising athletics nations.
At the Doha 2019 Championships, Team Nigeria endured a barren outing, failing to register a single medal. Three years later in Oregon 2022, Ese Brume broke the drought with a stunning gold in the women’s long jump — Nigeria’s first-ever world title in the event.
The momentum continued into Budapest 2023, where world record holder Tobi Amusan claimed silver in the women’s 100m hurdles, cementing Nigeria’s presence among the elite hurdlers. In Tokyo this year, the nation repeated the feat in the same event, albeit again settling for silver.
A comparative glance at the last four editions shows a troubling trend: Nigeria has not improved its medal tally, with just one medal each in 2022, 2023, and 2025.
This raises urgent questions about depth, consistency, and investment in talent development beyond the few star performers.
Comparative Medal Table (2019–2025)
- Doha 2019 – 0 medals (No standout performance)
- Oregon 2022 – 1 Gold (Ese Brume, Women’s Long Jump)
- Budapest 2023 – 1 Silver (Tobi Amusan, 100m Hurdles)
- Tokyo 2025 – 1 Silver (100m Hurdles)
The pattern underscores Nigeria’s reliance on individual brilliance rather than systemic excellence. Athletics analysts argue that unless the Athletics Federation of Nigeria (AFN) strengthens grassroots programs, invests in coaching and sports science, and improves athlete welfare, the country risks stagnating while competitors from Africa and beyond surge ahead.
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BY KUNLE SOLAJA.
Nigeria wrapped up its campaign at the 2025 World Athletics Championships in Tokyo with a single silver medal, finishing joint 25th on the overall medals table with eight others on the medals tables as the curtain was drawing on the championship.
The position may even deepen at the end of the day.
Star hurdler Tobi Amusan delivered the country’s only podium finish, placing second in the women’s 100m hurdles.
Despite the modest medal haul, several Nigerian athletes impressed with near-misses and record-breaking efforts.
Ezekiel Nathaniel narrowly missed out on a medal in the men’s 400m hurdles, finishing fourthin a national record time. Kanyinsola Ajayi also reached the men’s 100m final, settling for sixth, while shot put specialist Chukwuebuka Enekwechi placed fifthin his event.
Nigeria fielded 15 athletes – eight men and seven women – in Tokyo. While the performances reflected resilience, the lack of medals beyond Amusan’s silver highlighted gaps in preparation and depth.
Analysts point to the absence of Nigeria’s traditionally strong relay teams, logistical challenges, and inadequate athlete support as major setbacks.
Sports observers insist that the Athletics Federation of Nigeria (AFN) must chart a new path if the country is to climb the global athletics ladder.
Key recommendations include better logistics and athlete welfare, renewed focus on relay programmes, grassroots talent identification, and consistent funding.
Despite the below-par medal count, the performances in Tokyo suggest Nigeria still possesses world-class potential. With reforms and stronger administration, the AFN has an opportunity to turn near-misses into podium finishes at future championships.
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