Fastest male runner in Nigeria, Seye Ogunlewe is set to race against world’s fastest man this Saturday, 13th of August.
The 24-year old athlete was interviewed by BBC in Rio for the 2016 Olympics while he prepares for the men’s 100m race with Jamaican gold medalist Olympian, Usain Bolt.
This is what BBC has to say about Seye Ogunlewe.
“Nigeria’s fastest man, Seye Ogunlewe, has been bracing for the men’s 100 meters at the Rio Olympics, later this week. His ultimate goal is – almost certainly– to defeat the big favorite Usain Bolt and he’s allegedly said that he will “shock the world”. The BBC’s Ben James asked him to elaborate on that, but our colleague began by asking him what its takes to confront and possibly pip a sprinting legend at the post.”
In the interview, Seye Ogunlewe speaks preparing for his race,
“It’s just general preparation like what we’ve been doing before. You train, eat, recover, get treatment, do a lot of psychological work, visualise the race [and] just enjoy the moment – don’t think about it too much just relax. But also think about why you’re here and the country’s flag and how you want to do the best for yourself and the country.”
On Usain Bolt’s love for fries and chicken nuggets/fried chicken, Seye says “Different people have different things that work for them. Some people can eat fries, chicken and still do ok some people are really rigid and want to do everything, some of us are like that for instance you can eat fries but not a ridiculous amount of fries.”.
On eating Brazilian foods, there are variety of stuffs but I’m not really too keen on going to experiment at this stage in the competition because I don’t know what is what so I just stick to what I know, maybe rice, veg [vegetables] chicken and fish. Maybe after I finish running I’ll start experimenting on different Brazilian foods or Chinese foods.
Seye Ogunlewe on visualizing the race and finishing ahead of Usain Bolt says it’s a different side to psychology.
“You have to visualise yourself doing the right things concecutively and its just a process, you need to stick to your own process. You can think about it but dont let it overwhelm you and make you loose focus on what you’re meant to be doing,” he said.
Seye also clarified the news that said he boosted on shocking the world at Rio.
“I saw the interview and I was like, I never said that why did you say that? [They said] they were like just trying to make the headline seem very… just trying to make it seem like you’re going to shock the world and I said okay cool.”
