CHARLES Okeze, who won the 200m at the John McDonel Invitational in Fayetteville, North Carolina, U.S., on Monday said his eyes were set on the International Association of Athletics Federation (IAAF) World Championships standards.

The News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) reports that the World Championships will hold from Sept. 28 to Oct. 6 in Doha, Qatar.

Okeze told NAN from his U.S. base that in spite of winning the 200m race with a time of 20.88secs, he hoped to keep improving.

“The goal is go ahead and get the World Championships standards and hopefully, with God, I should be able to achieve it soon.

“The goal for the season is to achieve whatever height God has planned for me,” he said.

According to him, the world championship standards for the 200m male and female are 20.40secs and 23.02sec respectively.

The Little Rock, Arkansas Collegiate senior, said he wanted to keep improving to make his family and supporters proud of him.

“Basically, my family, my parents have given so much for me to be here today; and honestly, I do it for them.

“And for the friends and many people who believed that I can actually be someone to reckon with in this sport,” he said.

Okeze identified long jump as another event he would have loved to compete in because it was dynamic.

“If not the 200m, I think I would have loved to do the long jump; I just love the whole dynamics of it,” he said.

Okeze, however, said that it was quite tedious combining schooling with sport, saying he was always ready to make the best out of the situation. (NAN)

– Apr. 29, 2019 @ 12:59 GMT |