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MEDAL HOPE DASHED: Nigeria's Jonathan Akinyemi crashes out of the Canoeing event

Jonathan Akinyemi became Nigeria's first Olympic slalom canoe competitor on Sunday, although his involvement in the London Games lasted a mere 190 seconds.



That was how long it took the English-born 23-year-old to complete two runs down the churning white water of Lee Valley in the qualifying round of the men's kayak K1 event.

It was not good enough to earn the top 15 spot that would have qualified him for Tuesday's semi-finals, leaving the accounting student cursing a few careless moments.

The overseas-based athlete, who was the event's lowest-ranked entrant at 130 placed 20th in a field of 22 competitors after the first two runs to drop out of the chase for medals.

Akinyemi took part in the men's kayak single (K1) competition of the canoe slalom event holding at the Lee Valley White Water Centre.

His placing in the heats meant he was not part of the top 15 who qualified for the semi-finals of Aug. 1.

Akinyemi, who has a British mother, took to the water first during the first run and clocked 104.70 seconds to finish 20th, and then 146.95 seconds in the second run to finish 21st.

This, however, still earned him the 20th place finish after the second run, with the 104.70 seconds as his final time, thus finishing 21.21 seconds behind, more than 12 seconds slower than the last qualifier at 15th in the heat.


Akinyemi


``It sounds crazy but I was really pleased with the way I paddled today, but the time penalties make it look awful on paper," Akinyemi, who amassed 60 seconds worth of them, told reporters. ``It's one of those things, isn't it?"

The heat was however won by Germany's Hannes Aigner who clocked a time of 83.49 seconds in the second run to dislodge Samuel Hernanz of Spain who led from the first run with his first time of 87.07.

Togo's Benjamin Boukpeti who was a bronze medallist at the Beijing Olympics in 2008 fared better than Akinyemi, as he escaped dropping out of the contest with a time of 90.52 for 10th place.

He had placed 17th with a total time of 95.28 seconds in the first run, but he qualified in 14th place with his second run.


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