National Open Athletics: Sreeshankar shatters national record in long jump

Bhubaneswar: Sreeshankar Murali of Kerala shattered the men's long jump national record with a big jump of 8.20m on way to winning the gold at the National Open Athletics Championships here on Thursday.

The 19-year-old bettered the earlier national record of 8.19m which was in the name of Ankit Sharma made in Almaty in 2016. He came up with 8.20m in his fifth and penultimate jump.

He also had a jump of 8.11m in his third attempt, which was also better than his previous personal best of 7.99m.

His 8.20m jump is the world leading jump of the season among Under-20 athletes, bettering Cuban Maikel Yorges Vidal's 8.12m effort in June.

Sreeshankar was selected in the Indian team for the Gold Coast Commonwealth Games but just days before the big event he underwent an appendix surgery. In the recent Asian Games in Indonesia, he had finished sixth with a best jump of 7.95m in the final.

Sreeshankar begun the competition strongly, clearing a distance of 7.95m in his very first jump. After fouling his second jump, he set a new personal best jumping 8.11m in his third attempt.

After another foul attempt in his fourth attempt, he set the new national record in his penultimate attempt.

Sreeshankar was followed on the podium by Services athlete V O Jinesh who jumped a credible 7.95m. That effort was better than the previous meet record of 7.87m set by Ankit Sharma at the 2014 edition of the tournament in New Delhi.

The bronze medal went to Haryana's Sahil Mahabali who secured a new personal best by clearing 7.81m. The jump beat his previous best was 7.56m.

Another bright performance on the day came through Murli Kumar Gavit who completed a golden double in the 5,000m and 10,000m at the Kalinga Stadium.

Gavit had won a gold medal on the first day of the competition in the 10,000m and he followed it up in the 5,000m on Thursday. Gavit, representing Gujarat, clocked a relatively slow time of 14.35.96 seconds but that was still enough to beat out Railways' Abhishek Pal who clocked 14:36.62 seconds to claim the silver medal.

Services athlete Man Singh took the third step of the podium after recording a time of 14:37.18 seconds.

The women's 5,000m race was meanwhile won by L Suriya who clocked a time of 16.10.35 seconds. Fellow Railways athlete Parul Choudhary claimed the silver medal with a time of 16.13.88 seconds while Monika Athare of LIC came third with a time of 16.24.42 seconds.

Commonwealth Games bronze medallist Navjeet Kaur missed out on the chance to complete a golden double in the women's shot put and discus throw after she was beaten by Kamalpreet Kaur in the discus event. Navjeet, had won gold in the women's shot put event on the opening day but was edged to silver medal by Kamalpreet Kaur on Thursday.

Navjeet was leading until the final throw of the competition with a throw of 54.84m but fellow Railways athlete Kamalpreet, flung the iron disc to 56.11m in her final throw of the competition to secure the gold. Sandeep Kumari made it an all Railways podium after she claimed bronze with a throw of 53.96m.

With depleted fields in the men's shot put and hammers throw, gold medal were secured by Services athletes Praveen Kumar and Taranvir Singh. Kumar threw the iron ball a distance of 18.76m to secure a gold medal in the shot put, beating Jasdeep Singh and Sunil Kumar who recorded best throws of 18.73 and 18.09m respectively. The meet record stood at 19.82m.

In the men's hammer throw, Taranvir Singh secured his gold with a throw of 63.12m. The silver and bronze medals went to Damneet Singh and Sukhdev Singh of ONGC and Railways respectively. Damneet Singh, who had won a silver medal at the 2017 World Youth Championships recorded a throw of 62.27m. Sukhdev meanwhile recorded a throw of 61.56m.