{"id":61598,"date":"2025-09-13T22:08:19","date_gmt":"2025-09-13T22:08:19","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/lesotho\/all-news\/nigerian-duo-shine-in-tokyo-100m-semifinals"},"modified":"2025-09-13T22:39:18","modified_gmt":"2025-09-13T22:39:18","slug":"nigerian-duo-shine-in-tokyo-100m-semifinals","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/lesotho\/all-news\/nigerian-duo-shine-in-tokyo-100m-semifinals","title":{"rendered":"Nigerian Duo Shine in Tokyo 100m Semifinals"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><span style=\"color: #ff6600\"><strong>Africa-Press &#8211; Lesotho. <\/strong><\/span>Nigeria\u2019s Kayinsola Ajayi and Israel Okon have stormed into the semifinals of the men\u2019s 100 meters at the World Championships in Tokyo, marking a historic debut on the global stage.<\/p>\n<p>Ajayi was the standout performer, blazing to a new personal best of <b>9.88 seconds<\/b> to finish second in his heat behind South Africa\u2019s Gift Leotlela, who clocked 9.87 seconds. The 23-year-old\u2019s performance not only makes him the <b>third-fastest Nigerian sprinter of all time<\/b>, but also cements his place as the record-holder for the <b>most sub-10 second runs by a Nigerian in a single season<\/b>\u2014five in total this year. That tally also ties him atop the Nigerian all-time list for the most sub-10s in a career.<\/p>\n<p>Israel Okon, competing in his first senior global event, showed nerves of steel as he dominated his heat with a composed run of <b>10.04 seconds<\/b>. He finished ahead of Britain\u2019s Zharnel Hughes (10.06s) and Italy\u2019s Olympic champion Marcell Jacobs (10.20s), who had written his name into history at the same Tokyo track four years ago.<\/p>\n<p>The Nigerian duo now head confidently into the semifinals, carrying the hopes of a nation and underlining the country\u2019s growing sprinting pedigree on the world stage.<\/p>\n<p><strong>For More News And Analysis About <span style=\"color: #ff6600\">Lesotho<\/span> Follow <span style=\"color: #ff6600\">Africa-Press<\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Africa-Press &#8211; Lesotho. Nigeria\u2019s Kayinsola Ajayi and Israel Okon have stormed into the semifinals of the men\u2019s 100 meters at the World Championships in Tokyo, marking a historic debut on the global stage. Ajayi was the standout performer, blazing to a new personal best of 9.88 seconds to finish second in his heat behind South [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":84,"featured_media":61597,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2,17],"tags":[245],"class_list":["post-61598","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-all-news","category-sport","tag-lesotho"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO Premium plugin v26.1 (Yoast SEO v27.0) - https:\/\/yoast.com\/product\/yoast-seo-premium-wordpress\/ -->\n<title>Nigerian Duo Shine in Tokyo 100m Semifinals - Lesotho<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"Nigeria\u2019s Kayinsola Ajayi and Israel Okon have stormed into the semifinals of the men\u2019s 100 meters at the World Champion ...\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/lesotho\/all-news\/nigerian-duo-shine-in-tokyo-100m-semifinals\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Nigerian Duo Shine in Tokyo 100m Semifinals\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Nigeria\u2019s Kayinsola Ajayi and Israel Okon have stormed into the semifinals of the men\u2019s 100 meters at the World Champion ...\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/lesotho\/all-news\/nigerian-duo-shine-in-tokyo-100m-semifinals\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"Lesotho\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:publisher\" content=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/AfricaPressTunisiaa\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2025-09-13T22:08:19+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:modified_time\" content=\"2025-09-13T22:39:18+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"https:\/\/static.africa-press.net\/lesotho\/sites\/62\/2025\/09\/sm_1757786768.90545.jpg\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:width\" content=\"1280\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:height\" content=\"720\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:type\" content=\"image\/jpeg\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"cfeditoren\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"cfeditoren\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"2 minutes\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\/\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"Article\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/lesotho\/all-news\/nigerian-duo-shine-in-tokyo-100m-semifinals#article\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/lesotho\/all-news\/nigerian-duo-shine-in-tokyo-100m-semifinals\"},\"author\":{\"name\":\"cfeditoren\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/lesotho\/#\/schema\/person\/068c7ab4e9634ae78ec5d54ec46598bb\"},\"headline\":\"Nigerian Duo Shine in Tokyo 100m Semifinals\",\"datePublished\":\"2025-09-13T22:08:19+00:00\",\"dateModified\":\"2025-09-13T22:39:18+00:00\",\"mainEntityOfPage\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/lesotho\/all-news\/nigerian-duo-shine-in-tokyo-100m-semifinals\"},\"wordCount\":220,\"commentCount\":0,\"image\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/lesotho\/all-news\/nigerian-duo-shine-in-tokyo-100m-semifinals#primaryimage\"},\"thumbnailUrl\":\"https:\/\/static.africa-press.net\/lesotho\/sites\/62\/2025\/09\/sm_1757786768.90545.jpg\",\"keywords\":[\"Lesotho\"],\"articleSection\":[\"all news\",\"sport\"],\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"CommentAction\",\"name\":\"Comment\",\"target\":[\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/lesotho\/all-news\/nigerian-duo-shine-in-tokyo-100m-semifinals#respond\"]}]},{\"@type\":\"WebPage\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/lesotho\/all-news\/nigerian-duo-shine-in-tokyo-100m-semifinals\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/lesotho\/all-news\/nigerian-duo-shine-in-tokyo-100m-semifinals\",\"name\":\"Nigerian Duo Shine in Tokyo 100m Semifinals - 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