Blessing Okagbare
Category: Who is Who in Nigeria
Blessing Okagbare-Otegheri is a former Nigerian track and field athlete who
specialized in Long jump and sprints. She is an Olympic and World
Championships medalist in the long jump, and a world medalist in the 200
meters.
Born on October 9, 1998 to Francis and Margeret
Okagabarein Sapele, Delta State. She is 1.8m tall and weigh about
71kg(1571b).
Given her athletic physique, teachers and family
encouraged her to take up sports. Initially she played football as a teenager
at her high school and later, in 2004, she began to take an interest in track
and field. She participated in a number of disciplines early on, competing in
the long jump, triple jump and high jump events at the Nigerian school
championships and winning a medal in each. On the senior national stage, she
was a triple jump bronze medalist at the 2004 Nigerian National Sports
Festival. Okagbare's first international outing came at the 2006 World Junior
Championships in Athletics, where she performed in the qualifying rounds of
both the long and triple jump competitions.
As a 19-year-old, she won a silver medal in the women's long jump
event at the 2008 Summer Olympics in Beijing.
She won the Nigerian
100 m title in 2010, running a time of 11.04 seconds, and stated that she was
opting out of the long jump in order to save herself for the upcoming African
championships.
At the African Championships in 2010, she won gold
in the long jump again with a distance of 6.62 m while her compatriot Comfort
Onyali took silver. Okagbare also won gold in the 100 m distance with a run of
11.03 s flat, while Gabon's Ruddy Zang Milama and compatriot Oludamola Osayomi
won silver and bronze with runs of 11.15 s and 11.22 s respectively . She won
her third gold at the end of the championship as part of the Nigerian 4×100 m
women's relay team. The team of Okagbare, Osayomi, Lawretta Ozoh and Agnes
Osazuwa set a new championship record with a run of 43.43 s, more than a full
second ahead of the silver-winning Cameroonian quartet.
In 2011, Okagbare continued to build on her earlier endeavors by
establishing herself as a 100 m runner. At the 2011 World Championships in
Daegu, Okagbare placed fifth in the 100 m final with a run of 11.12 s.
However, she did not make it to the final of the long jump as her best jump of
6.36 m was not enough to get her out of her qualifying group. She concluded
her 2011 season by winning three medals at the All Africa Games in Maputo,
Mozambique. She won silver in the 100 m behind compatriot Oludamola Osayomi
with a run of 11.01 s and gold in the long jump with a jump of 6.50 m. She was
part of the Nigerian quartet that won gold in the 4 × 100 m with a time of
43.34.
She won new continental medals at the 2012 African
Championships in Porto-Novo. In the 100 m she was beaten to silver by Zang
Milama, while in the long jump she claimed gold with a jump of 6.96 m.
In April 2013, in Walnut, California, Blessing Okagbare set a personal record
in the 200 m with a time of 22.31 s. Then, in July, she improved her personal
best in the long jump with successive jumps of 6.98 m at the Athletissima meet
in Lausanne, and 7.00 m during the Monaco Herculis meet. On 27 July 2013, at
the London Anniversary Games, Okagbare set a new African record of 10.86 s in
her 100 m race. She won the final about an hour later, setting a new African
record of 10.79, in a race where she beat reigning 100 m Olympic gold medalist
Shelly-Ann Fraser-Pryce. Okagbare's record eclipsed the existing record by
compatriot Glory Alozie of 10.90 s which had stood since 1998.
At
the 2013 World Championships in Moscow, Okagbare won the silver medal in the
long jump. Her jump of 6.99 m put her in second place behind Brittney Reese of
the United States by only two centimeters. In the 100 m final, she placed
sixth with a run of 11.04 s and also placed third in the 200 m race.
In 2014, Okagbare participated in both the 100m and 200m races.
She made it through to the finals of the 100m and won with a time of 10.85,
breaking the games record of 10.91 seconds set by Debbie Ferguson-McKenzie 12
years earlier at the 2002 Commonwealth Games in Manchester. Okagbare also won
the gold medal in the 200, with a time of 22.25 seconds. In doing so, she
became the fourth woman to win the 100m and 200m double at the Commonwealth
Games.
She ran the lead off leg in the 4 × 200 m at the 2015 World
Relays. The team consisting of Okagbare, Regina George, Dominique Duncan and
Christy Udoh, won the race and set an African Record in the process. She did
not appear in the 200 meters at the IAAF World Championships or the All Africa
Games due to a hamstring injury she sustained while finishing last in the
final of the 100 meters at the World Championships. At the end of the season,
she did participate in the IAAF Diamond League meet, the Weltklasse Zürich in
Zurich, finishing second in the 100 meters.
It was initially
reported that Okagbare was banned from representing Nigeria at the 2016
Olympics. The Athletics Federation of Nigeria eventually refuted the claim.
Though she opted out of the individual events at the All-Africa Games, she did
run in the 4 × 100 m relay and help the Nigerian team (Cecilia Francis,
Okagbare, Ngozi Onwumere and Lawretta Ozoh) secure the gold medal.
Blessing had a disappointing show at 2016 Rio Olympics as she
finished without a single medal. She never made it to the final but was ranked
3rd in 100m semifinal finishing at 11.09s and ranked 8th with her teammates in
the final of 4 × 100 m relay.
In 2021, Okagbare won her first round heat in the 100 metres with
a time of 11.05. She was subsequently suspended on 31 July 2021 after failing
a drug test taken on 19 July 2021, which tested positive for human growth
She is currently serving a 10 year ban for breaching multiple World Athletics
anti-doping rules. Her ban expires 30 July 2031.
Okagbare was
suspended after failing drugs test on 31 July 2021 during the 2020 Tokyo
Olympics. On 18 February 2022 it was announced that she had been banned from
athletics for a period of 10 years commencing 30 July 2021 for multiple
breaches of World Athletics Anti-Doping rules. Following a hearing at the
Athletics Integrity Unit that found her to have taken both human growth
hormone and EPO over an extended period, and to have failed to co-operate with
the investigation, Okagbare was banned for ten years, effectively ending her
athletics career in disgrace.
Blessing is married to Nigerian
footballer, Igho Otegheri since September 2014.
News About Blessing Okagbare on ACKCITY News;
Doping! Blessing Okagbare Reacts To 10 Year BanNigerian Athlete, Blessing Okagbare is Now a Guinness World Records Holder
No comments