Raymond Ekevwo races to the top of 100m list, runs 10.04s season’s best

Reigning African Games fastest man Raymond Ekevwo raced back to global reckoning Saturday at the 2022 Michael Johnson Invitational, stopping the clock at an impressive 10.04 seconds to come first.

The 23 year old improved on the 10.11s he ran last week at the USTAF Golden Games in Walnut, California to race to the top of the Nigerian 100m list for the year ahead of Udodi Onwuzurike who held the top mark for three weeks following his 10.07s run in Stanford early this month.

Ekevwo’s time is also his third fastest ever after running 9.96s to win the African Games gold in Rabat in August 2019 and 10.02s at the SEC championship in Fayetteville, Arkansas in May of the same year.

The Delta state born athlete has brought to three the number of Nigerian sprinters who have broken 10.10 seconds this year after Alaba Akintola also ran a new 10.09s personal best last week at the War Eagles invitational.

In the women’s 400m, Imaobong Nse Uko broke 53 seconds for the first time this season as she ran 52.89 to place sixth while in the men’s javelin, World U20 bronze medallist, Chinecherem Prosper Nnamdi Baylor came within a centimetre of equalling the Nigerian record of 81.08m set in 1999 by Pius Bazighe.

Chinecherem threw an incredible 81.07m to win the event and improve on the 78.42m he threw in Austin, Texas last month.