M.R. Poovamma, the fastest qualifier in the semifinals, retained her 400m silver while Liksy Joseph came up with an inspired performance for the heptathlon silver with a personal best as India’s women athletes did themselves proud at the 21st Asian athletics championship here on Thursday.
Purnima Hembram, a former Asian junior champion, followed Liksy for the women’s heptathlon bronze, and in the men’s section, G. Lakshmanan won the 5,000m bronze bettering his personal best by nearly 14 seconds.
Qatar’s Femi Ogunode did what he had been promising for some time by lowering his own Asian 100m record to a stunning 9.91s. That should make him the fifth fastest man in the world this year.
The Nigeria-born Ogunode had set the previous mark of 9.93 while winning the Asian Games gold in Incheon last year.
There were disappointments too for India, with both the country’s eight-metre long-jumpers, Ankit Sharma (7.76m) and K. Prem Kumar (7.69m) finishing fourth and fifth respectively.
Ankit was in the medal range for a brief while before going down. An eight-metre jump would have fetched them gold, for it was with a 7.96m that China’s Goa Xinglong took the top spot.
Poovamma, the Asian Games bronze medallist who has a personal best of 51.73s, was in fact quicker in Wednesday’s semifinal which she topped with 52.94s. Her silver, behind China’s Yang Huizhen, came in 53.07s.
Arokia Rajeev, also an Incheon Asiad bronze medallist, was seventh in the men’s 400m while Srabani Nanda was fifth in the women’s 100m.
The women’s sprint relay team finished fourth and the men sixth. Suprisingly Manikanda Arumugam, who had helped the team to qualify for the Asians in 39.11s in the controversial trials in Bengaluru recently, was not part of the men’s relay squad which finished in 39.67s.
Qatar’s Mohamad Al Garni, who had won the men’s 1,500m on Wednesday, completed a distance double by taking the 5,000m title.
The results:
Men: 100m: 1. Femi Ogunode (Qat) 9.91s [Asian record, OR: 9.93, own, 2014 Asiad, Korea], 2. Zhang Peimeng (Chn) 10.15, 3. Reza Ghasemi (Iri) 10.19. 400m: 1. Abdelilah Haroun Hassan (Qat) 44.68s, 2. Yousef Ahmed Masrahi (KSA) 45.14, 3. Sato Kentaro (Jpn) 46.09, 7. Arokia Rajeev (Ind) 46.65. 5,000m: 1. Mohamad Al Garni (Qat) 13:34.47s [MR, OR: 13:39.71], 2. Albert Rop (Brn) 13:35.26 [BMR], 3. G. Lakshmanan (Ind) 13:36.62 [BMR]. 4x100m relay: 1. China 39.04s, 2. Hong Kong 39.25, Taipei 39.35, 6. India (Jyothi Shankar Debnath, Krishna Kumar Rane, Amiya Kumar Mallick, Abdul Najeeb Qureshi) 39.67. Long jump: 1. Goa Xinglong (Chn) 7.96m, 2. Ted Hooper (Tpe) 7.80, 3. Tang Gongchen (Chn) 7.79, 4. Ankit Sharma (Ind) 7.76, 5. K. Prem Kumar (Ind) 7.69. Pole vault: 1. Zhang Wei (Chn) 5.60m, 2. Yamamoto Seito (Jpn) 5.50, 3. Huang Bokai (Chn) 5.50. Hammer throw: 1. Dilshod Nazarov (Tjk) 77.68m, 2. Ashraf Amgad Elseify (Qat) 76.03, Wan Yong (Chn) 73.40.
Women: 100m: 1. Fukushima Chisato (Jpn) 11.23s [MR, OR: 11.24], 2. Viktoriya Zyabkina (Kaz) 11.34, 3. Wei Yongli (Chn) 11.46, 5. Srabani Nanda (Ind) 11.48. 400m: 1. Yang Huizhen (Chn) 52.37s, 2. M.R. Poovamma (Ind) 53.07, 3. Anastassiya Kudinova (Kaz) 53.41. 5,000m: 1. Bethlhem Desalegn (UAE) 15:25.15s, 2. Alia Mohammed Saeed (UAE) 15:28.74, 3. Daria Maslova (Kgz) 15:42.82. 4x100m relay: 1. China 43.10s [MR, OR: 43.41], 2. Japan 44.14, 3. Thailand 44.73, 4. India (Sini Sahadevan, M.G. Padmini, Srabani Nanda, Dutee Chand) 45.72. Discus throw: 1. Su Xinyue (Chn) 63.90m, 2. Tan Jian (Chn) 62.97, 3. Lu Xiaoxin (Chn) 62.30, 6. Navjeet Kaur Dhillon (Ind) 51.66. Heptathlon: 1. Ekaterina Voronina (Uzb) 5,689 pts, 2. Liksy Joseph (Ind) 5,554, 3. Purnima Hembram (Ind) 5,511.
