They (Government of Nigeria) must catch the athletes when they are young. We started very young. They must encourage the athletes with good incentive… - Modupe Oshikoya

The Commonwealth Games gold medal in 1974 in New Zealand in the long jump event was special. I was close to winning the gold in the hurdles too but I tripped towards it and ended up with a bronze medal.

Running and jumping came to me naturally. It was while I took to athletics which was known as track and field then. I took part in basketball, badminton, table tennis, and a few other sports when I was growing up but it was athletics that I stuck to.

We were already at the 1976 Montreal, Olympics in Canada and waiting for the opening ceremony before we pulled out of the competition a day before it. Everybody was disappointed because of the hard work we had put in preparing for the Olympics for four years but it wasn’t the end of the world.