As Jo Pavey is rightly lauded in the UK for making it to Rio for what will be her fifth Olympic Games, cast your mind to the Nigerian Table Tennis team.  Segun Toriola will be part of that team and participating in his seventh Olympics!!  We wish him well.

In other Olympic news, Uganda’s Stephen Kiprotich will have strong support in his quest to reclaim the Olympic marathon title backed by World Championship bronze medallist Solomon Munyo Mutai and 2013 Mumbai marathon champion Jackson Kiprop in the Ugandan team.

Picture- By urbanora (Flickr: Persson v Toriola) [CC BY-SA 2.0 (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/2.0)

Sierra Leone’s Ismail Dudu Kamara will be taking on Usain Bolt and co in the 100 meters, Rio perhaps coming a little early for a young man with a bright future in the sport.  Rebecca Kpossi will be proudly bearing Togo’s flag at the opening ceremony on Friday before taking on the world’s best in the swimming pool.  Of course the fierce rivalry in long distance running events will be fought between Ethiopia and Kenya, although I admit that I’ll be keeping a close eye on one Mo Farah.

Beatrice Kamuchanga, 19, a young woman from the small eastern village of Kirotshe, will represent Congo in the 5000 metre race in Rio.  For her, running isn’t about aiming for Olympic glory. ”Running gives me energy to study even when there is no food to eat,” a humbling thought perhaps for the world’s best golfers who can’t be bothered to board the plane to Rio.

The Executives in Africa team will be watching closely and will be delighted to see any African sports people atop the medal rostrum in the coming weeks.

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