Lagos — Quarter-miler, Bola Lawal of Oyo State at the weekend beat all comers to emerge the fastest man of the maiden Ladi Lawal Athletics Classics in Lagos. In the absence of Onyeabor Ngwogu, winner of the Makurdi leg of the AFN Meet and Oghoghene Egworo the runner up, Bola simply strolled to an unimpressive 10.51 to pick the title and the N20, 000 prize money at stake.

Enugu athlete, Christopher Nwanze (10.65) and Henry Azike of the Police team won the silver and bronze respectively. In the women version, Agnes Osazuwa and Susan Akene (both of the Civil Defence team) renewed their rivalry on the tracks of the University of Lagos Sports Complex with the former smiling away with the sprint title. Osazuwa hit the finish line in 11.3 while Akene clocked 11.4. Another of their NSCDC mate, Helen Emedolu (11.5) won the bronze to complete a clean sweep for the Para-military team.

However, Sunday Bada, technical/performance director of the Athletics Federation of Nigeria (AFN) was far from being impressed with the times recorded at the meet.

"How can our male athletes be running 10.5 to win the Classic in late June? I am not impressed at all. They ought to have done better than what we are witnessing here today. What it means is that their progression cannot go beyond at most 10.2 or 10.0 flat. What will that fetch us in this era when top athletes are already running low 9?" The police superintendent insisted that there was more work for our coaches to do if Nigeria is to return to the top. "There is certainly more work for our coaches. I also know that for the serious athletes desirous of making impact now and in the immediate future, these results are enough to make them sit up and concentrate more on how to turn things around. All the same, I am happy that the reintroduction of the monthly classics has begin to expose our athletes to how deep the rot has set in," observed the former World Cup winner and Nigeria's most successful male athlete of all-time.

Ngwogu who was at the UNILAG Sports Complex to watch events from the sideline attributed his inability to defend his sprint title here to illness.

" I came back from Trinidad and Tobago with sickness. I have been battling typhoid since. I didn't know I had it before leaving Nigeria for the race in T/Tobago. It was while training for the race that I took ill and had to manage. It affected my performance. But on return to Nigeria during the week, I had to go to LUTH and it was diagnosed to be typhoid. I am on medication now, hopping to be okay to be a part of the Nkoyo Ibori Classics in Oghara next week," revealed the promising Nigerian sprinter.