Amusan gunning for fifth Diamond League win in 20 appearances
Nigerian set to compete for the first time at the Silesia Diamond League meeting
July 14, 2023
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World 100m hurdles queen and record holder (12.12), Tobi Amusan will be gunning for her fifth win in the event in the Diamond League on Sunday
evening when the competition makes eighth of its scheduled 14 stops in Silesia, Poland.
It will be the first time the 26 year old Nigerian will be competing at the Silesia Kamila Skolimowska Memorial which became a Diamond League meeting host
just last year.
Amusan has won in just four of the 19 appearances she has made in the World Athletics elite one day meeting and, interestingly, two of the wins came in the
final of the series in Zurich in 2021 and 2022.
The Nigerian did not get her first Diamond League win until her 12th attempt which interestingly was in the final in Zurich, Switzerland two years ago.
The best the petite Nigerian got before then were second places finishes in Doha (2019) and at the Allianz Memorial Van Damme in Brussels, Belgium (2021).
Amusan competed in four Diamond League meetings in 2018 and made her debut in the competition at the Roma Golden Gala – Pietro Mennea in Rome, Italy.
She ran 12.86 to come third in the race, her best performance that year in the competition.
She competed in five meetings the following year with her second place (12.73) in Doha her best performance that year while in 2021, she ran in just three
Diamond League meetings.
That was the year she made history as the first Nigerian to win a Diamond League discipline after running 12.42 seconds to break Gloria Alozie’s 21 year old
12.44 seconds African record.
Amusan won twice in five Diamond League meetings in 2022, the year she made history as the first Nigerian to win a world outdoor title, set a world outdoor
record and successfully defended a Diamond League title.
She won her first 100m hurdles event at the Meeting de Paris, running 12.41 to break her own African record. Her second win came in the final leg of the
competition in Zurich where she set a new meeting record (12.29) to defend her title.
The reigning world champion will thus be seeking a morale boosting win ahead of the World Championships in Budapest, Hungary where she will be seeking to become the third woman after the American duo of Gail Devers and Michelle Perry to successfully defend a 100m hurdles world title.
