The expectations were not met but there was a promise of a bright tomorrow as Siddhant Thingalaya won the men’s 110 metres hurdles with a time of 13.84 seconds in the 17th Federation Cup athletics championships that concluded at the NIS here on Friday.
Having shown his class in winning the 100 metres with a time of 10.55 seconds and then declaring that he went flat out to increase his speed for the hurdles, the 22-year-old Thingalaya had triggered a lot of hope that he would meet the ‘B’ standard qualification for the World Championships that stood at 13.50 seconds.
With A. Suresh of Tata Motors breathing down his neck, Thingalaya did fly over the hurdles, but a hamstring twitch stopped him from going full blast for the mark.
In men’s 200 metres, Manikanand Raju handled the finish energetically in pipping Rahul Pillai of Kerala. Commonwealth Games gold medallist Krishna Poonia won the discus throw with her first attempt of 57.25 metres. In the absence of Seema Antil and Harwant Kaur, there was no competition for Krishna who had celebrated her 36th birthday on Thursday.
Olympian Om Prakash could not weave any magic in men’s shotput as he won the gold with a first throw of 18.91 metres, better than his efforts in the recent domestic Grand Prix meets, but far from the qualifying standard of 20.10 metres and his yet-to-be-ratified national record of 20.69 metres.
Jaisha impresses
O.P. Jaisha was too good in the women’s 5000 metres as she left everyone behind nearly by 200 metres in winning the event, while Suresh Kumar shot ahead of the pack early in winning the men’s 10,000 metres in 29 minutes 40.61 seconds. Mayookha Johny won the triple jump gold with a last attempt of 13.46 metres. She was more than two feet behind her national mark of 14.11 metres.
Arpinder Singh who won the triple jump and M.R. Poovamma who reigned supreme in 400 metres were adjudged the ‘best athletes’ in the men’s and women’s sections respectively.
Oil and Natural Gas Corporation (ONGC) walked away with the overall team championship with 177 points and Kerala finished runner-up with 113 points.
The results:Men: 200m: 1. Manikananda Raju 21.41; 2. Rahul G. Pillai 21.61; 3. Ritesh Anand 21.63. 1500m: 1. Ranjan Kariyappa 3:48.26; 2. Sandeep 3:48.51; 2. Pranjal Gogoi 3:48.72. 10,000m: 1. Suresh Kumar 29:40.61; 2. Arjun Pradhan 30:06.70; 3. Md. Yunus 30:12.92. 110m hurdles: 1. Siddhant Thingalaya 13.84; 2. A. Suresh 13.92; 3. Pinto Mathew 14.55. Shot put: 1. Om Prakash Singh 18.91; 2. Jasdeep Singh 17.58; 3. Ashwani Solanki 17.37. 4x400m relay: 1. Tamil Nadu (Deepan Chakravarthy, Sagayaraj Francis, Mervin, Arokia Rajiv) 3:12.53; 2. Air Force (E.K. Joseph, R.K. George, Vikas Chandran Sachin Roby) 3:13.32; 3. ONGC (Bino Aquito, Manjeet Singh, Ghamanda Ram, Davinder Singh) 3:14.07.
Team championship: 1. ONGC 79; 2. Tamil Nadu 51.
Women: 200m: 1. Asha Roy 23.70; 2. Srabani Nanda 23.96; 3. Dutee Chand 24.14. 800m: 1. Sinimole Paulose 2:08.04; 2. Sushma Devi 2:08.23; 3. Gomathi 2:10.20. 5,000m: 1. O.P. Jaisha 16:39.43; 2. Lalita Babbar 17:22.78; 3. Swati Gadhave 17:34.99. 100m hurdles: 1. Hema Shree 14.37; 2. Sajitha 14.40; 3. Sumandeep Kaur 14.49. Triple jump: 1. Mayookha Johny 13.46; 2. Merena Joseph 13.12; 3. Amitha Baby 12.96. Discus: 1. Krishna Poonia 57.25; 2. Navjeet Kaur 48.53; 3. Manish 43.62. Hammer: 1. Gunjan Singh 57.80; 2. Manju Bala 57.24; 3. P. Sarita 52.26. Heptathlon: 1. Sushmita Singha Roy 5080; 2. Navpreet Kaur 4935; 3. Niksy Joseph 4913. 4x400m relay: 1. ONGC (Priyanka Mondal, Jyoti Rani, Anju Rani, M.R. Poovamma) 3:44.43; 2. Kerala (Anilda Thomas, Ambika Sreedharan, Anju Thomas, Anu mariam Jose) 3:44.71; 3. Punjab (Ramandeep Kaur, Manpreet Kaur, Sukhwinder Kaur, Kamal Kaur) 4:07.51. Team championship: 1. ONGC 98; 2. Kerala 73.
