Renowned Nigerian athletics coach, Samuel Akinyemi, has promised to win a medal in the women sprints, if allowed to coach Nigeria's queen of the tracks, Damola Osayomi for the Beijing Olympic Games, according to Daily Independent report on Monday.
The coach on Sunday said what the athlete needed to be on the podium was for him (Akinyemi) to work on her dynamics, noting that Osayomi has the strength to win in Beijing.
"With me as her coach, she would run 10 seconds, and if she did this the gold is up for grab," he said.
Akinyemi is pleading with the Athletics Federation of Nigeria ( AFN) not to allow the athlete (Osayomi) go back to the United States for Olympics preparation but allow him to coach her for the Beijing Games.
"Before she left for the USA, she ran 11.38 seconds through me. In the United States her best time was 11.10 seconds. When I coached her for the Mobil trials, she ran 11.08 seconds in the semis.
"My life ambition is to win an Olympic medal for Nigeria. I almost achieve this ambition with Seun Ogunkoya, but some people who lured him away denied me. It was this ambition that was the driving force in discovering her.
"Now is the opportunity for me to achieve this life long ambition, the same people have lured her away saying she should go back to the United States of America," he said.
"I Am pleading that I should be allowed to coach her for the Olympics so that I can achieve my lifelong ambition before I retire, " he said.
"For four years, Fatima Yusuf could not run 49 seconds in the quarter mile event. But when I was allowed to coach her for the All Africa Games in Harare in 1995, she not only won the gold but set a new Africa record of 49.43 seconds then. The record before this was 50.49 seconds. She worked with for only few weeks in Germany," he said.
(Xinhua News Agency July 8, 2008)