August 03, (THEWILL) – Team Nigeria finally showed up on the podium for a medal after Ese Brume earned the country its first medal of the Tokyo 2020 Olympic Games in the early hours of Tuesday. The long jumper leaped to a third place finish in the women’s event to claim the bronze medal and put Nigeria on the medals table.
After enduring days of misery and near finishes without reaching any top three places from different events with medal hopefuls in tennis, basketball and the close calls in Nigeria’s forte in track and field, it comes as a huge relief to finally get off the mark with Brume’s long jump achievement.
The 25-year-old, who THEWILL reported set a new African mark in women’s long jump with an astonishing 7.17 metres leap at the Chula Vista Festival in May, leapt 6.97 metres with her very first jump in Tokyo to compete to a bronze finish behind Team USA’s Brittany Reece and Germany’s Malaika Mihambo, who won the gold.
Since the 2008 Summer Olympics in Beijing, China, when African sprint champion Blessing Okagbare won silver, Nigeria has been without a medal in the track and field and Brume restored Nigeria’s reckoning in the long jump individual event in the mold of another Nigerian amazon, Chioma Ajunwa, whose fame remains Nigeria’s only individual gold medalist.
Brume was a top medal contender after her May jump at the Chula Vista Festival earned her the African long jump record because her 7.17m leap record overshot Ajunwa’s 25-year African record, which had earned Ajunwa an Olympic gold at the Atlanta 1996 Olympics in the USA.
Her bronze is consolation enough for Nigeria and it places her on the exclusive set of Nigerian athletes, including Okagbare and Glory Alozie, to have won individual medals at both the Worlds championships stage and the Olympic Games competitions.
However, Brume looked on course for the gold while the competition ragged on between the Nigerian and her American opponent Reese on Tuesday morning. Brume had a leading jump of 6.97m which set the standard in the first of six attempts for the entire field.
They continued swapping top spot in the gold race before Mihambo jumped to 7.00m in her last leap to claim the top spot with the added gloss of joining an Olympic gold to the world title she won in 2019 at the IAAF World Athletics Championships in Doha, Qatar.
The competition came to a head in that final round in a battle between Mihambo, Reese and Brume for the gold medal. That was when Mihambo came in with that monster last jump, leaping a masterful 7.00m to move from bronze and lock in the gold for good.
About the Author
Jude Obafemi is a versatile senior Correspondent at THEWILL Newspapers, excelling in sourcing, researching, and delivering sports news stories for both print and digital publications.
