Nairobi, August 20: National U20 record holder Shaili Singh was one of three women Long Jumper who secured automatic qualification, set at 6.35m, for the final when she leapt 6.40m on her third attempt. She would have made the grade on the strength of her opening leap of 6.34m but chose to strain every sinew on her final attempt to gain the psychological edge going into Sunday’s final.
Later, Kunwar Ajai Raj Singh Rana raised brief hopes of winning a men’s Javelin Throw medal with his second best throw of the year before finishing fifth on the third day of the in the World Athletics U20 championships. Jay Kumar took the sixth place with a best effort of 70.74m. After two throws past the 70 mark, Kunwar Ajai Raj Singh Rana rose to the bronze medal position with 73.68m on his fourth try, but Nigeria’s Chnecherem Nnamdi regained the third place on the charts with a 74.48m response. And in the fifth round, Poland’s Eryk Kolodziejczak also bettered the Indian’s best throw to nudge ahead of Rana to fourth place.
Earlier, Nandini Agasara made it to the women’s 100m Hurdles semifinals by being fourth in her heats in 14.18 seconds and though she clocked a faster 14.16 seconds in the semifinals, her journey ended as she was sixth in her semifinal heats. She will be disappointed that she was not able to dip in under 14 seconds as she had done in three races earlier this season.
Shanmuga Srinivas Nalubothu clocked 21.33 seconds in the men’s 200m heats – his second fastest time over the distance this year – but that was not good enough to take him to the semifinals. In the men’s 3000m Steeplechase, Sunil Joliya sought to match the pace of the front runners early on in the heats but finished 11th in 9:49.23 in his maiden international race.
Tejas A Shirse 110m H 13.87 seconds to be fifth in the third heats. He was faster than Czech Republic’s Tomas Oberndorfer who gained automatic entry to the semifinals by being third in his heats. Had Shirse matched his National U20 Record time of 13.74 seconds, clocked in Sangrur on August 1, he would have made it to the semifinals.
In the women’s 1500m, Pooja was unable to match the pace set by the leaders and finished 11th in her heats in a time of 4:37.85. Having timed a personal best of 4:19.58 in Guwahati on February 7 this year, she stayed within sight of the front runners and was sixth at the bell but was overtaken by four others with 300m left.
