Fast-rising Nigerian quarter-miler, Samuel Ogazi set all tongues wagging on Saturday as he set a new African 400m record at USA’s National Collegiate Athletics Association (NCAA) Indoor Championship finals in Fayetteville.
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Sports247 reports that the new African indoor men’s quarter-mile time of 44.57sec by the University of Alabama undergraduate paved way for a series of other outstanding feats by Nigerian athletes at the same venue.
Ogazi, who was a finalist at the 2024 Olympic Games in Paris, France, led through the first lap of the 400m in 20.92 from Justin Braun and, though the gap closed slightly on the second lap, the Nigerian lad’s rival could only finish second with 44.67.
It also meant that the 19-year-old Ogazi, who grew up in Kaduna, has equalled the ratified world short track record, though Khaleb McRae’s equal mark set at the same venue last month is pending ratification.
He was a bronze medalist at the 2024 African Championships and won the 2025 NCAA Outdoor Championships, before which he previously competed in the 4×400 m relay at the 2022 World Athletics U20 Championships in Cali, Colombia.
Ogazi also won the 200m and 400m at the 2023 African U18 and U20 Championships in Ndola, Zambia; then won gold over 200 metres and 400 metres at the 2023 Commonwealth Youth Games in Trinidad and Tobago.
He also won gold in the mixed 4×100 m relay to set a new games record, then set a new Nigerian U18 record for the 400 metres in March 2024, running 45.35s to finish second overall behind Christopher Morales Williams in Louisiana.
Just last month, at the New Mexico Collegiate Classic in Albuquerque, Ogazi ran an indoor personal best of 44.85 seconds for the 400 metres and a facility record time of 44.72 seconds to win the 400 metres at the SEC Indoor Championships
Also on Saturday, Kayinsola Ajayi equalled his own African record of 6.45 to win the men’s 60m from Jelani Watkins (6.48), a day after they both raced against each other in the heats – with Watkins clocking 6.46 to Ajayi’s 6.51.
Dejanea Oakley won the women’s 400m final in an indoor PB of 50.47, while Ella Onojuvwevwo of Nigeria placed third in the final with 50.76, a day after she got a world-leading 50.28 in the heats, thereby breaking an African record of 28 years.
