The Indian mixed relay team pocketed a coveted silver on Day 2 of the World Under-20 Athletics Championships. The fantastic quartet of Barath Sridhar, Priya Mohan, Kapil and Rupal Chaudhary clocked 3:17:76 seconds enroute to their silver glory and set up a new Asian Junior record.
India was nipping on USA's heels who clinched gold medal with a stunning record time of 3:17.69s. Jamaica took bronze with a timing of 3:19.98.
Indian team had bagged a bronze in the mixed 4x400m relays in the last edition in Nairobi, Kenya in 2021, where the event was introduced. Rupal is the only new member of the quartet that had won bronze last year while Sridhar, Priya and Kapil were there in that team.
Earlier, in the heats, the India team clocked 3:19.62 on day 1 of the competition to finish 2nd overall and qualify for the final. This was better than their last year’s bronze medal-winning effort of 3:20.60, which was also an Asian Junior Record.
On Tuesday, Rupal and Priya made it to the 400m semifinals after strong performances in the first round heats. Rupal won heat in 52.50s while Priya clocked 52.56s to finish second in heat number 5. Rupal was second overall across five heats while Priya was fourth. Priya had finished fourth in the 400m final in the last edition in Nairobi in 2021.
The 15-year-old Ashakiran Barla made it to the women 800m semifinals as one of the four fastest runners outside the four automatic qualifiers each from the five heats. She clocked 2:09.01s to finish sixth in heat number 1.
Sanyam Sanjay finished 13th overall in shot put qualification round with a best effort of 18.36m and missed the final by just 0.01m.
The other Indian shot putter, Sawan finished 15th with a best effort of 18.31m.
Aman Khokhar could not make it to the 100m dash semifinals after finishing seventh in heat number 8 and 48th overall with a timing of 10.84 seconds.
Arjun Waskale failed to advance further in men's 1500m race after finishing seventh in heat number one and 26th overall with a timing of 3:51.10s.
Meanwhile, in the latest list of sanctioned athletes issued by Athletics Integrity Unit of the world governing body, India's triple jumper Donald Makimairaj, who had finished fourth in the World U-20 Championships last year, has been banned for four years after testing positive for a banned drug.
His ineligibility period will be upto August 24, 2025 and his results after August 2, 2021 will be annulled.
