Patiala, June 25 Indian men’s 4x400m relay team on Friday enhanced its chances of qualifying for the next month’s Tokyo Olympic Games by clocking 3 minutes 01.89 seconds on the opening day of the National Inter-State Athletics Championships here.
This timing is likely to improve India’s world ranking from 16th to 13th before the qualification deadline of June 29. Only top 16 world ranking teams are eligible to compete in the Olympics.
Muhammed Anas Yahiya, Amoj Jacob, Arokia Rajiv, and Noah Nirmal Tom had on Monday clocked a time of 3:02.61 at the Indian Grand Prix IV. They combined well to post a better time on Friday at the National Institute of Sports campus.
However, the women’s 4x100m quartet of Archana Suseendran, Hima Das, S. Dhanalakshmi and Dutee Chand, chasing the magical mark of 43.05 seconds to attain qualification for the Olympic Games, fell short of 0.45 seconds in the heats on Friday.
The Indian team had set a national record of 43.47 seconds in the IGP IV on Monday.
In the men’s 100m heats in the morning session, Gurindervir Singh of Punjab was the fastest with a 10.41 seconds while Amiya Malik of Odisha showed glimpses of regaining form with 10.50 seconds in winning his heats.
The results (all finals):
Men’s:
10,000m: 1. Vikram Bharatsingh Bangriya (Madhya Pradesh) 30:16.44 seconds; 2. Kartik Kumar (Uttar Pradesh) 30:25.79 secs; 3. Dinesh (Maharashtra) 30:50.74 secs
Pole Vault: 1. Shekhar Kumar Pandey (Uttar Pradesh) 4.80m; 2. Dhirendra Kumar (Uttar Pradesh) 4.50m; 3. Parveen Kumar (Haryana) 4.50m
Women’s:
5,000m: 1. Parul Chaudhary (Uttar Pradesh) 16:04.07 seconds; 2. Komal Chandrakant Jagdale (Maharashtra) 16:26.89 secs; 3. Ankita Dhyani (Uttarakhand) 16:58.07 secs
100m hurdles: 1. C Kanimozhi (Tamil Nadu) 13.66 seconds; 2. Agasara Nandini (Telangana) 13.70; 3 secs; WVL Sugandi (Sri Lanka) 13.90 secs
Triple jump: 1. Renu (Haryana) 13.23m; 2. KM Sonam (Uttar Pradesh) 12.96; 3; Athira Surendran (Kerala) 12.55.
Hammer throw: 1. Manju Bala (Rajasthan) 61.08m; 2. Sarita R Singh (Uttar Pradesh) 56.13; 3m; Surabhi Ganesh Vedpathak (Maharashtra) 54.77m