Indian men’s 4&400m relay team close to Olympic ticket
The Indian men’s 4x 400m relay team has strengthened its chances of getting a ticket to Tokyo Olympics by clocking 3 minutes 01.89 in the 60th Fast and Up National Inter-State Athletics Championships. With this effort, the Indian team will now move from 16th place to 13th position in the Olympic Games rankings.
The quartet of Mohammad Anas, Amoz Jacob, Arokia Rajeev and Noah Nirmal Tom were aiming to improve their timing of 3:02.61 at the Indian Grand Prix here on Monday. The Indian team had clocked 3:02.59 in Turkey on 25 July 2019 to drop to 16th place. The Olympic qualification window ends on 29 June and the team had its fastest time since 10 July 2016. Then the team of Kunju Mohd, Mohd Anas, Ayyasamy Dhruv and Arokia Rajeev clocked 3:0091 seconds in Bangalore.
Women’s four times 100m relay team Archana Susindran, Hima Das, S Dhanalakshmi and Dutee Chand were aiming for the Olympic Games qualification target of 43.05 seconds but fell behind by 0.45 seconds in the heat itself, the team won the Indian Grand on Monday. Set a new national record of 43.47 seconds in Pre 4 and his time is faster than the meet record set by Tamil Nadu (45.69).
Vikram Bharat Singh Bangaria of Madhya Pradesh won the men’s 10000m race while Parul Chaudhary of Uttar Pradesh won the women’s 5000m race.
Returning to hammer throw after a gap of two years, Rajasthan’s Manju Bala won the gold with a throw of 61.08m in her fifth attempt.
