By Adam Beauchemin
Ottawa Olympic sprint stars Jacqueline Madogo and Eliezer Adjibi shone for the hometown crowd and both won their second shiny bronze medals of the 2025 Canadian Track and Field Championships Sunday afternoon at Terry Fox Athletic Facility.
After getting faster and faster during her Olympic debut at Paris 2024, Madogo was seriously slowed by injury during the wintertime, but the 25-year-old is pleased to be rounding back into top form.
“It’s been a challenging season,” she outlined. “I broke my foot in December, so we’re just getting fit through like all the races. We’re just seeing where we’re going.”
On the heels of her 11.21-second bronze medal performance in the women’s 100 metres Friday night, Madogo raced to third place again in the women’s 200 m Sunday.
Her time of 22.81 seconds wasn’t far off her 22.58 personal-best performance in Paris.
“We always line up being competitive and athletic, we always want to win. But today wasn’t my day,” said Madogo, who won the national title in the race in 2023.
Madogo finished behind Canadian record holder Audrey Leduc of Gatineau, who won in 22.55, and Madogo’s Royal City teammate Zoe Sherar (22.78).
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“It was a good field,” highlighted the Franco-Ouest high school grad who initially went to the University of Guelph focused on soccer. “I knew they were gonna be fast and I just wanted to run a smooth bend and then project myself through the home stretch, and I think I executed the race plan pretty well.”
From here, Madogo will be competing in the 2025 North American, Central American and Caribbean Championships in the Bahamas. She said she’s also shooting for the 2025 World Championships in Tokyo, with her eye on running faster than 22.57 to secure her spot.
Adjibi has also been dealing with a slight knee injury, which kept him from getting quite the push he was after in Friday’s 100 m when he ran 10.21 to take third behind winner Duan Asemota in 10.12.
“In the 100, I didn’t compete as I expected,” signalled Adjibi, who set a new personal-best mark of 10.02 earlier this season. “But it’s okay. Stuff like that happens. You can’t win every race.”
Adjibi was in peak form for Sunday’s 200 m however when he shaved .12 off his personal-best in the distance with a 20.60 effort en route to his bronze medal finish.
First place in the 200 m went to Jerome Blake, who was disqualified from the 100 m dash after a false start, but broke the 20-second barrier with a 19.95 performance in the 200 m finals. He was trailed closely by 100 m silver-medalist Aaron Brown, who earned a time of 20.08 in the 200 m to place second. Seven-time Olympic medallist Andre De Grasse did not compete in Ottawa due to a hamstring issue.
“My plan today was to come calm, no stress,” Adjibi recounted. “Because I know those two guys, they’ll have like a better 200 than me. I’m still coming up on my 200, getting better slowly.”
Despite the knee pain, Adjibi said he decided to give the race everything he had. Now, with the Canadian Championships behind him, the 24-year-old CANI Athletics sprinter said his goal is to earn a World Championships qualification standard time in the 100 m, set at the magical 10.00 mark.
“I’m super, super close, but I’m not quite there yet, so I have to go to Europe to run a few 100s, 200s, so I can get this,” indicated the Louis-Riel high school grad.
Another CANI athlete hit the podium in a 200 m event, with Will Batley racing to his second medal-worthy photo-finish performance of the meet in under-20 men’s competition.
Batley earned his silver medal with an official time of 21.003, finishing a sliver ahead of bronze medalist Brandon Choumbe Yami in 21.004. While Tooni Ogunyeye finished first in the race with a time of 20.65, the next four athletes all finished within 0.02 seconds of one another.
“I thought I had it again. But there’s always the thing, where you just want to make sure not to celebrate early until you see where you finished,” Batley noted. “So to see that I came second after thinking I did, just felt good.”
The recent West Carleton Secondary School grad had missed his senior year of high school track dealing with injuries, which he said has made his success this weekend feel all the better.
“It just feels good to know that I’m still up there with everyone, even after coming back from injury. Just to know I’m still there with the best in Canada for my age group feels good,” said Batley, who edged out Jahnie Leslie by .003 for a spot on the 100 m podium Friday.
A loud cheer came for the hometown runner after his name appeared on the time clock to confirm that he had earned second place in the 200 m.
“Just having it in Ottawa, and be able to have family, friends and grandparents come and watch just feels great,” added Batley, who won the U20 200 m nationals last year in 20.76.
After a long weekend of competing at home, Batley soon will be heading to St. John’s, Newfoundland to compete in the Canada Summer Games.
“I’m super excited,” said the Team Ontario member who’s previously raced for Canada internationally.
Jorai Oppong-Nketiah from the host Ottawa Lions Track and Field Club charged to her second U20 women’s gold medal of the weekend with a 23.54 effort in the 200 m. She edged out second-place Hailee Woodhouse who finished in 23.695, and bronze-medalist Ashley Odiase who ran 23.698.
While Oppong-Nketiah has been dealing with multiple injuries, she said she had been focusing on her 200 m race and still had her sights set on the double gold this weekend.
“I’m excited. I’ve been working on it, so hopefully I get double gold,” the 17-year-old Louis-Riel high school student said after earning her first gold in the 100 m in 11.48.
This is Oppong-Nketiah’s second year in a row earning two medals at the U20 nationals, but her first time earning two golds. Last year, she won the U20 100 m in 11.43 – a time that would have placed her third in the senior women’s category at the Canadian Olympic team trials.
Safwan El Mansari was another Lion who hit the podium in U20 competition Sunday as he took silver in the men’s 800 m in a time of 1:51.14.
A pair of CANI Athletics high jumpers added two more medals to the local haul as Thomas Sénéchal-Becker won the senior men’s event with a leap of 2.11 m and Hans Lafleur grabbed bronze with his 2.08 performance.
Read More: CANI jumpers patiently wait to reach new heights, rewarded with nationals medals
Two Ottawa Lions relay teams established new club records in the 4×400 m races.
Ayoub Shangai, Ange-Mathis Kramo, William Sanders and Zachary Jeggo finished the U20 men’s 4×400 m relay in 3:10.62, to secure a new Canadian club record in the race.
Their effort not only broke the previous U20 4x400m national club record of 3:14.80 (which they set earlier this summer), it also puts them ahead of the senior record time of 3:11.02, which was set by the Ottawa Lions in 2014.
“It really meant a lot for us to do it all together. Last time we ran a four, we were all injured a little bit,” noted Shangai. “So just to come back and break four seconds off our time, it was really crazy.”
Even despite setting a record, the Lions squad is still looking to improve.
“We all had a great race, there’s a lot of wind, so we can definitely improve on it,” said Jeggo, who had already earned medals in the 400 m and 400 m hurdles.
The women’s open 4×400 m squad composed of Alexandra Telford, Sydney Smith, Maeliss Trapeau and Lauren Gale managed to surge past the Canadian club record, also set by the Lions in 2023.
The key to their success? A lot of training, and the right team mindset.
“We just had such a strong team going in, it was super positive,” highlighted Smith.
“It gave us some confidence,” added Telford, who claimed her first individual national medal a day earlier.
Their time of 3:38.31 put them nearly 12 seconds ahead of the previous record time of 3:50.18.
With their own individual schedules, it was a tiring weekend of action for the runners, which is why they say having the right mindset and teammates is all the more crucial to staying competitive.
“I think it’s very tough on all of us. Four, hurdles, eights — those are not easy events, so just the mindset of having fun, and going in together, always makes it more fun,” explained Smith.
Despite all this, the team pulled together a record setting performance and they say that with fresher legs, they reach even greater heights.
“On a good day, I think we could run a 3:30,” Telford indicated.
A second Lions relay team was second in the senior women’s 4×400 m relay, while the Lions were also third in the U20 women’s 4×400 m relay, the senior men’s 4×400 m, the U20 women’s 4×100 m, the senior and U20 men’s 4×100 m and the winners in the senior women’s 4×100 m, while CANI was second in the women’s senior mixed team 4×400 m event
There were 2,222 total entries across all events as Canada’s best came to the nation’s capital for the July 30-Aug. 3 nationals.
Read all of the Ottawa Sports Pages’ coverage of the event via the links below:
CANI Athletics jumpers patiently wait to reach new heights, rewarded with nationals medals
Maeliss Trapeau makes triumphant return home from France to win Canadian women’s 800 m gold
Injuries fail to hold back Jorai Oppong-Nketiah from repeat U20 women’s 100 m national title
Recent high school grad Daniel Cova storms to hometown U20 silver medal in his new 5,000 m pursuit
