Priya Mohan in women’s 400m and Amandeep Singh Dhaliwal in men’s shot put enter the finals even as Vipin Kumar in men’s hammer throw fail to cross the season’s best.
India won the bronze medal in the mixed 4x400m relay event on the opening day of the World Athletics U20 Championship at the Kasarani Stadium, Nairobi in Kenya on Wednesday evening.
Barath Sridhar ran the opening leg followed by Priya Mohan and Summy while Kapil who ran the anchor maintained the lead behind Nigeria and Poland with a time of 3 minutes 20.60 seconds. Priya who qualified for the women’s individual 400m race was running the third race of the meet but was equally good. For Summy and Kapil it was the second race while Barath replaced Abdul Razak who ran in the heats.
Nigeria with a time of 3:19.70s, a championship record, won the gold followe by Poland who timed 3:19.80s.
In the morning India entered the final winning the heat with an impressive time of 3 minutes 23.36 seconds. Nigeria topped the heat with a time of 3:21.66s.
The split timings of the Indians in the heat were Razak (48.18s), Priya (53.70s), Summy 54.63s and Kapil 46.85s. They beat two strong teams in the heat which included Poland and Jamaica. First three from two heats and two best finishers qualified for the final.
Czech Republic, Jamaica, Poland, Sri Lanka, Italy and South Africa were the other finalists.
Earlier in the women’s 400m, Priya (53.79s) qualified when she finished third in her heat. Priya’s compatriot Summy, in the second heat, who finished fifth failed to enter the final. The 400m final is scheduled to be held on Sunday from 7 pm (IST approx).
Meanwhile, in the men’s shot put event, qualified for the final with a distance of 17.92m. Even though the qualification was set at 19.20m only three achieved it and the Indian who was 12th and finalist made the cut on the basis of the 12 best performers. The final will be held on Thursday from at 5.20 pm (IST approx).
The other Indian to compete on the first day included Vipin Kumar in men’s hammer throw. He finished 20th out of the 24 competitors with a mark of 63.17m. The automatic qualifying mark was 74.00m.
In the men’s javelin throw event, Kunwer Ajai Singh Raj Singh Rana who has a season’s best of 74.75m finished fourth in his qualification (Group A) with a throw of 71.05m.
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