Access Bamk Lagos City Marathon: Omatseye Nesiama Hails Nigerian Marathoners

The Athletics Federation of Nigeria Technical Director, Navy Commodore Omatseye Nesiama, has commended Nigerian athletes for the timing they returned in last Saturday's Lagos City Marathon.

Nesiama said it is a good sign for the federation and Nigeria as a whole, adding that if they train a

little harder than they did for the race, they will medals for the country at the summer Rio Olympics staging in Brazil.

Kenya's  Abraham Kipton won the race after returning a time of 2hr: 16mins: 19secs while the first Nigerian to return, Sharubutu Philip finished the race in 2hrs:30min:31secs, just about 15 minutes away from Kipton's time.

The Technical Director told tomiwababalola.com the prospects of Nigerian athletes and the benefits they stand to gain this year: "Nigerians have done well, they've been able to hold themselves high up among the very best and when you talk about Nigerians. I want us to also distinguish the Nigerian regular athletes from those who ran for fun. the percentage of the people that ran this race is very encouraging, especially the timing they returned.

Most of them returned within the 2 hours-3hrs 30mins  time frame, and that is very good. 

"It means that if this set of people actually train for this race in another two years, they will be breaking into the range of 2hrs to 2 hrs30mins max, which is good. It means that we can be exposing them into international competitions, and that will also bring about some funding, and support for them."

"Great plans, the plans we have which was echoed by the Vice President, International Association of Athletics Federation, Col. Hamad Malboum that they will help us to establish a high altitude high performance center in the Northern part of the country, which for us is a very big thing."

"We pushed for that a while ago, and now that the IAAF vice president has made the pronouncement, we will take him up on that, and I see that as a very good faal out from this event."

"This is the very first the Athletics Federation of Nigeria are having this year, and it is also the very first in a long time that we will have a major sponsor supporting us. It is also the event that has made the IAAF promise to establish a performance centre for long and middle distance, so, its a great time for athletes in that category."

"The great plan the AFN have for the athletes is this; they will soon have the opportunity to train with the best equipment, best support systems and coaches, and that is a good sign. You see the performance system, from our experience is not something that drops from the sky, it's built over time, and with this pronouncement, we can go ahead and ask for some supports personnel to support their coaches right now, wherever they are training. And that's why i say its a very big opportunity for us and we are not going to lose it, we will seize it with both hands and deliver good services to our athletes."

"Moreover, we have plans to organise one long-middle distance competition this year that will give them opportunity to qualify for major international competitions including the Olympics."

"In my capacity as the technical director, and the support of my technical team and the board, I can assure you that any athlete that meets the Olympics qualification standards will go to the Olympics for marathon, and I believe also that, since we have decided that, we will get sponsor for the athlete."

"We will definitely go for Olympics by God's grace because we have athletes who have already qualified and we will not want to deny them from going especially if we feel they can make impact there. Secondly, we are preparing but I cannot tell you how prepared the athletes are until after the games in Brazil, because that will judge the performances of our athletes, but I can tell you that we have intensified our preparations, and hopefully it will translate into winning medals."

"we are asking for collaborations and this (Access Bank Lagos City Marathon) is a good sign, it is a kind of thing that we expect from corporate organisations. Over the years, we have tried to establish our integrity as a body that we can do things with or without support on our own and we have been doing that, using our own resources, now, we hope we can be able to attract willing sponsors, like Access Bank to come on board. And if this continues, we can run successfully programs we've mapped out for this year, then we are rest assured that we will make an impact in the summer Olympics this year."

"Right now we have the world leading throw in shortput, an area we've not had appreciable impact in a long time. Stephen Hosea threw 21-6, which he has done twice now, and this means its not a fluke, baring ratification, its our national record, a very good time for any male shortput throw. If we encourage him a little more and help him balance psychologically, then he should be able to do something at the Olympics, and this is one area that people weren't talking about as at two months ago."

"Our 4x4 women have the third world leading time as i'm talking to you now, that is a medal potential and some other athletes, who are doing very well, and we will be seeing their impacts from next month, when the world indoors takes place."