Blessing Okagbare wins 100m race at Oregon meet

Nigeria’s Blessing Okagbare on Saturday won the women’s 100 events at the Oregon Relays in 10.97 seconds, the second-best time in the world this year.
“With these conditions, I’ll take that,” Okagbare said.

Allyson Felix, a six-time Olympic champion and 13-time world champion, was seventh in 11.30 as she aims for a 200m Olympic berth at age 35.

“It kind of starts it off, dropping down and working on a few things,” Felix said.

“Excited to get it going.”

The meet, staged in breezy and wet weather, was the first elite event contested at the University of Oregon’s renovated Hayward Field, site of June’s US Olympic trials and next year’s IAAF World Championships.

In February, Okagbare obliterated the field in the final with a new lifetime best of 7.10s to clinch a top spot at the third leg of the American Track League event in Fayetteville, Arkansas, ahead of Jamaica’s Christiana Williams (7.14s) and Teahna Daniels of the United States (7.17s).

The 32-year-old Okagabre carried her fine form over to the 200m event at Fayetteville, blazing to another lifetime best of 23.01s to win her heat.