Throwers Sachin and Navjeet attain Eugene qualification with national junior records

Chennai: Haryana discus thrower Sachin accomplished what he was longing for – a national junior record! The 18-year-old athlete already had two outings in the international arena three years ago when he represented the nation in the World Youth Championships at Villeneuve de Ascq, France, and Commonwealth Youth Games at Douglas, Scotland.

However 2014 will be a memorable year for Sachin as he set his goal for the first-ever gold on his career outside the country. The record-hungry Haryana boy grabbed the top spot on his very first attempt on Saturday evening by hurled the 1.75 kg disc to a superb 58.11m, hence take away Punjab thrower Kripal Singh’s from the record-books in just 1 cm. His mark placed him in ‘numero uno’ position on the current Asian junior rankings (and eleventh in the World junior lists) and make him a hot-favourite for a podium finish in Chinese Taipei later next month. Iran’s Mojtaba Shabaneh had won the gold in the last Asian junior championships in Colombo, two years ago, with a performance of 58.79m.

Rajasthan’s Praveen Kumar missed the qualifier when finished second with 54.76m while another Haryana lad Nirbhay Singh settled with the bronze in 52.69m.

Navjeet sizzles in shot put

Punjab girl Navjeet Kaur Dhillon, who finished ninth in the senior Asian championships at Pune last year (where she finished seventh in discus throw), was the cynosure of all eyes as she improved upon her state-mate Manpreet Kaur’s six year old national junior record. Incidentally her record – 15.89m - also came on the very first round. Having pocketed the gold and satisfied the new mark, Navjeet skipped the remaining rounds and encouraged her teammate Manpreet Singh jr – who garnered the silver medal with 13.53m. Uttarakhand Ramanpreet Kaur was third with 13.50m.

Decathlete Ankit Saini become the second athlete from Haryana to qualify for the Asian junior championships today as garnered 6600 points to achieve it as also improved the meet mark that stood in the name of Bhupinder Singh of Punjab since 2006 by 23 points.

Hosts Tamil Nadu dominated the sprint relay event by annexed both the gold medals that were at stake today. The junior women team consists of Dhanalakshmi, Deepika, Vinodini and Archana improved upon Karnataka’s 13-year-old meet mark clocking a new time of 48.25 secs. Earlier Deepika won another gold by taking on the 100m hurdles in which Dhanalakshmi got a bronze medal. The silver medalist in that event – Meghana Shetty of Karnataka in 14.28 secs – have earned a berth in the national team for the Asian meet. As expected Kerala hurdler Nasimudheen had won the 110m hurdles in 14.35 secs .

Kerala team with 97 points pushed the previous day’s leaders and defending champion Haryana (92) to second spot in the championship race!