BENGALURU: India’s senior mixed 4x400 team at the Olympics: 3:19.93. India’s junior mixed 4x400 team at the U-20 Worlds: 3:20.60. That’s perhaps the starting point behind the country’s bronze at the event on day one of the U-20 Worlds in Nairobi on Wednesday.
The winning squad comprised of Barath S (47.12 seconds), Priya Mohan (52.77), Summy (54.29) before a solid anchor leg from Kapil (46.42) secured third place. Nigeria and Poland finished first and second respectively even as some of the better sprinting nations like US and Great Britain skipped the meet.
But the team can only race against the competition that’s present and they did that well, especially taking into account they didn’t have much time to prepare. “We had camps from 23 July, but few of them could not join because there was nationals in between too. After that we joined and worked as a team and we had baton exchange once in two days...,” Priya said during a press conference after the final.
The entire squad for Kenya was only announced earlier in the month after the completion of the junior Federation Cup. But, they did brilliantly to make people sit up and take notice about their bronze winning show. Also, one has to applaud Priya for her brilliant individual effort in the 400m, where she clocked 53.79s to qualify for the final. The 18-year-old qualified as one of the two best non-automatic qualifiers.
It was not an easy task with the Bengaluru girl having competed in the event just two and half hours post the relay heats in the morning. Overall, she ran three races on the day (two heats and one final). “It is a fantastic performance of 3:20.60s which is nearly as fast as the senior team that ran in Tokyo,” said AFI president Adille Sumariwalla. “This just goes to show the depth of the program at the junior level, inter-district, where the juniors are capable of competing with our seniors and it is just matter of time that we will be getting more and more medals and Neeraj Chopra has shown the way to all other athletes.”
Will this put pressure on the seniors who perhaps underpunched at Tokyo? Yes, if one goes by Sumariwalla’s words. “The best athlete will be part of the team,” he said. “We have a clear policy. Whosoever runs fastest will be in the 4x400m senior relay team.”
In the field events, the javelin throwers impressed as Kunwer Ajai Singh Rana and Jay Kumar qualified for the Final. Kunwer and Jay threw a distance of 71.05m and 70.34m respectively. Amandeep Singh qualified for the final of the men’s shot put with a throw of 17.92. However, in the hammer throw, things did not go as per Vipin Kumar’s plan as his throw of 63.17 was not enough for a final berth.