Salwa Eid Naser

Career

Born in Nigeria to a Nigerian mother and a Bahraini father, Salwa Eid Naser (previously known as Ebelechukwu Agbapuonwu in Nigeria) moved to her father's native country as a child. She began running at age eleven while at school and began to focus on the longer 400 m distance. Based in Riffa in Bahrain's Central Governorate, she had her first success at the 2014 Arab Junior Athletics Championships, where she was the gold medallist in both the 200 metres and 400 m. Following this achievement, she began to take the sport more seriously and set a new best of 54.50 seconds at the Asian Trials for the 2014 Summer Youth Olympics. She steadily improved her best further at the Youth Olympics, recording 53.95 seconds in the first round before taking the silver medal behind Australia's Jessica Thornton with a much improved time of 52.74 seconds.

Naser began working with former Bulgarian athlete Yanko Bratanov, who also coached fellow Nigerian-Bahraini Kemi Adekoya. At the start of 2015 she set national junior records of 11.70 seconds for the 100 metres and 23.03 seconds for the 200 m while in Bulgaria. She confirmed herself as the continent's best runner in her age group with a gold medal at the 2015 Asian Youth Athletics Championships. She then proved herself among the best globally at the 2015 World Youth Championships in Athletics. A patient run saw her overhaul the more favoured American Lynna Irby in the final stages of the race and she achieved a lifetime best of 51.50 seconds to take the gold medal. Running in a hijab, the final came on the day after Ramadan, which allowed her to eat normally before the race after having fasted during the qualifying rounds. The gold medal made her only the second Bahraini woman to win a global-level title, after senior world champion Maryam Yusuf Jamal. Her tactical running was praised by decathlon world record holder Ashton Eaton, who invited her on an all expenses paid trip to train with him for three days.

Naser took her first senior title at the 2015 Military World Games in October. Competing against 2012 Olympians Bianca Răzor and Nataliya Pyhyda, she improved further to win the 400 m title with a best of 51.39 seconds, becoming the youngest ever winner of that title.