BHUBANESWAR: Soon after taking the 5,000m gold on the opening day, Govindan Lakshmanan had said that winning a distance double would be asking for too much. But on a humid Sunday night, the 27-year-old from Tamil Nadu looked fresh as he broke away from the rest of the pack on the back straight and won the 10,000m gold at the 22nd Asian Athletics Championships here.
With that, Lakshmanan, who now has two tickets for next month’s London Worlds, became the first Indian to complete a 5,000-10,000m double at the Asians.
Lakshmanan and teammate T. Gopi stayed close to each other in the lead pack almost all through. But on the back straight, the champion, who is coached by Olympian Surender Singh, made his crucial move and appeared to run the last lap like a quartermiler.
“My coach had given me special workouts for this, the strategy was to run the last lap in 53 or 54 seconds,” said Lakshmanan, who hails from Sokku Rani village in Pudukottai.
Four more golds for India
India collected four more golds on the final day to take its total to 12 and finished the table topper, ahead of super power China, with its best-ever finish in these championships.
Neeraj Chopra, the under-20 world champion, heptathlete Swapna Barman and the men’s and women’s mile relay teams were the others to strike gold on Sunday.
With Taipei’s Chao-Tsun Cheng, one of the best throwers in the world this year, in the fray, many had felt it would be difficult for the 19-year-old Neeraj here.
The lead changed hands a few times but Haryana’s Neeraj came good when it mattered the most, uncorking a brilliant 85.23m on his final throw to take the gold, pushing Qatar’s Bader Magour Ahmed to silver. Another Indian, Davinder Singh Kang, took the bronze despite being under pressure after testing positive for marijuana late last month.
Heptathlete Swapna, who had an impressive high jump (1.86m) on Saturday that could have brought her a gold in the individual event here, won the multi-eventer with a personal best 5,942 points while teammate Purnima Hembram won the bronze.
Anchored by Tamil Nadu’s Arokia Rajiv, India won the men’s relay comfortably and in the women’s event, there was a bit of a fumble in the baton exchange between the young Jisna Mathew — who ran a brilliant third leg — and the anchor Nirmala Sheoran, but there were no worries in the end.
The final day’s gold count could have gone to six but Pune’s Archana Adhav, who won the women’s 800m, was disqualified later for obstructing two Sri Lankan athletes, Nimali Waliwarsha and Gayanthika Thushari, near the finish.
The race, which saw an unwell Tintu Luka — she was down with fever — dropping out after 500m, was packed with drama with some pushing, elbowing at the finish.
Still, at the end of the championships, it was a very happy finish for the host.
