Nigeria’s Ezekiel Nathaniel, reigning NCAA 400m hurdles champion and national record holder (47.31s), marked his debut Diamond League Final appearance with a podium finish on Thursday in Zurich.
The 22-year-old clocked an impressive 47.56 seconds to claim third place behind world record holder Karsten Warholm of Norway, who stormed to victory with a new meeting record of 46.70 seconds, and Qatar’s Abdelrahman Samba, who finished second in 47.45 seconds.
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By securing third place, Nathaniel not only made history as one of Nigeria’s few podium finishers in the elite World Athletics one-day meeting series but also pocketed $10,000 in prize money, a boost from the regular $7,000 after the 400m hurdles was classified as a Diamond+ discipline in Zurich.
Meanwhile, fellow Nigerian Udodi Onwuzurike also made his Diamond League Final debut, competing in the men’s 200m.
The 21-year-old finished eighth with a time of 20.54 seconds, rounding off a promising first season on the Diamond League circuit.
In the men’s 200m, American sprint star Noah Lyles produced a thrilling finish to edge Olympic champion Letsile Tebogo of Botswana.
Drawn in lane six, Lyles surged in the final 50 meters to stop the clock at 19.74 seconds, securing his sixth Diamond League trophy.
Tebogo finished just two-hundredths of a second behind in 19.76s, while Alexander Ogando of the Dominican Republic claimed third in 20.14s.
The Diamond League Final served as the perfect build-up to the World Athletics Championships in Tokyo, scheduled to begin in September, where Nathaniel, Onwuzurike, and other Nigerian and global stars will again be in action.
