Ferdinand Omanyala: How Africa’s Fastest Man Missed Over Ksh2.5 Million by Milliseconds in Shanghai

The 100m race is a race that is decided by the tiniest of margins and in most cases, it can be the difference between a big fortune and much less.

Africa’s Ferdinand Omanyala was on the cruel end of this at the weekend when he failed to bank over nearly Ksh2.6 million for running 0.01 seconds slower at the season-opening Shanghai Diamond League on Saturday.

Omanyala, who is enjoying a great start to the season, recorded his fourth sub-10 performance in Shanghai when he stopped the clock at 9.98 seconds for second place behind South Africa’s Gift Leotlela’s 9.97 while American Kenny Bednarek finished third in a season’s best 9.98 seconds.

In a race that also had Botswana’s Letsile Tebogo, Akani Simbine of South Africa and Americans Christian Coleman as well as Trayvon Bromell, it was a great outing for Omanyala.

The Kenyan looked like he had won the race in a photo finish but Leotlela edged it by just 0.01 (10 milliseconds), denying Omanyala a big prize.

At the Diamond League, there are two prize money structures; the Standard prize and Diamond+ Discipline. The standard prize pays out $10,000 (1.29 million) for winners in every event, $6,000 (Ksh777,540) for second place, $4,000 (Ksh518,360) for third place and the amount goes down to ninth place and beyond.

Meanwhile, "Diamond+ Disciplines" are select events that offer a significantly higher prize money, doubling the winner's payout to $20,000 (Ksh2,591,800) while the rest of the positions are equal to what is paid out in the Standard prize.

In Shanghai, the men’s 100m, 110m hurdles, women’s 200m and shot put were the "Diamond+ Disciplines," meaning Omanyala missed the $20,000 which went to Leotlela, while he had to settle for $6,000 being prize money for second place.