Coach advises Blessing Okagbare to focus on long jump, not sprinting
By Stu White
Although Nigeria’s Blessing Okagbare has gone 10.79 seconds in the 100 meters, her coach thinks it’s time for the 25-year-old to stop sprinting and start focusing more on the long jump.
As Olu Sule, Okagbare’s coach, explained to Vanguard, there are too many gifted runners in the 100 meters for Okagbare to win a gold medal in an international competition:
"“Okagbare should be concentrating on the long jump (because) she has more potential there. She is training for the 100m where there too many sprinters who are ahead of her. She should be focused on the long jump where she has enormous resources to make a potential 7.50m jump. “She has technique and great speed, which I have seen only in Chioma Ajunwa. Okagbare has height and long reach, she should consider this ahead of the 2016 Olympics because it is always going to be crowded in the 100m and 200.”"
Okagbare won a bronze medal in the long jump at the 2008 Beijing Olympics and a silver in the event at the 2013 IAAF World Championships in Moscow. She also competed in both the 100 meters and the 200 meters in Moscow, finishing seventh in the former and third in the latter.
[Source: Vanguard]