Wednesday, Dec 18, 2002
Wednesday, Dec 18, 2002 |
| Sport | ||
|
News:
Front Page |
National |
Southern States |
Other States |
International |
Opinion |
Business |
Sport |
Miscellaneous |
Advts: Classifieds | Employment | Obituary | Sport
-
National Games
By Abhijit Sen Gupta
Arun D'Souza (AP) signals his victory on the last lap of the 3000m men's steeplechase.
HYDERABAD DEC. 17. Andhra Pradesh continued to dominate the athletics events bagging four gold, one silver and one bronze in the six finals here today. Two meet records were also set. In the 3000 metre steeplechase, Arun D'Souza representing AP set a new meet record by clocking 8 min 54.07 secs as against the old mark of 8 min 58.10 secs set by Pradeep Kumar Dogra in 1985 in Delhi. The other record came in the women's heptathlon where J.J. Shobha chalked up 5888 points to erase the Games record of 5445 set by arch rival Soma Biswas in the previous edition. Harwant Kaur of Punjab bagged her second gold of the meet when she won the women's shot put with a distance of 15.53 metres. Yesterday she won the discuss gold. Second was N. Latha of Tamil Nadu who threw 15.06 metres while third placed Chaitali Pal of AP also threw 15.06 metres. The tie was broken by taking into account the second best throw, which in Latha's case was 15.04 mts while in Chaitali's case as 14.96 mts. The men's 200 mts final was hotly contested. Anand Menezes of Maharashtra, who is representing AP here, and Jagdish Basak of Punjab were the leading contenders in this event. Basak in lane four got off to a flying start and coming into the straight had a slight lead over the rest of the pack but with Menezes hot on his heels in lane five. With about 80 metres to go, Menezes began narrowing down the gap with a tremendous effort. Basak fought hard to stay ahead but Menezes ran like a man possessed to close the gap inch by inch till they crossed the finish line almost together. The clock eventually gave the gold to Menezes. His timing was 21.634 seconds which was fractionally better than Basak's 21.637 seconds. The men's 3000 metre steeplechase was totally a one-man show by Arun D'Souza who donned the AP colours here. He took the lead right from the first lap and continued to increase the margin. By the end of the fourth lap it was clear that he would win and the only question was by how much? A record looked certain even at this stage as Arun ran his own race, totally unchallenged far ahead of the rest of the field and he eventually finished nearly 100 metres ahead of second placed R. Suresh of Services. The women's heptathlon was dominated by J.J. Shobha of AP. She had impressive performances in all the seven events and broke the old record by a good margin. Second placed Bindu P. of Kerala was well behind at 4707 points. Shobha said later that her target now is 6000 points which she hopes to achieve by early next year. The results: Men: 3000m steeplechase: 1. Arun D'Souza (AP) 8m 54.07s (NMR) (OR 8m 58.10s); 2. R.Suresh (SSCB) 9m 12.71s; 3. Ranjan Kumar Jha (SSCB) 9m 16.29s. Hammer throw: 1. Rakesh Kumar (UP) 63.99m; 2. Gurinderjeet Singh (Chandigarh) 63.51m; 3. Harpal Singh (Punjab) 63.50m. 200m: Anand Menezes (AP) 21.634s; 2. Jagdish Basak (Punjab) 21.637s; Ajay Raj Singh (Punjab) 21.73s. Women: Shot put: 1. Harwant Kaur (Punjab) 15.53m; N. Latha (TN) 15.06m; 3. Chaitali Pal (AP) 15.06m. 200m: 1. Vinita Tripathi (AP) 24.03s; 2. S. Geetha (AP) 24.18s; 3. Kavita Pandya (Maharashtra) 24.20s. Heptathlon: 1. J.J. Shobha (AP) 5888 pts (NMR) (OR 5445 pts); 2. Bindu P. (Kerala) 4707 pts; Rosemary Anthony (Kerala) 4530 pts.
Printer friendly
page
News:
Front Page |
National |
Southern States |
Other States |
International |
Opinion |
Business |
Sport |
Miscellaneous |
|
|
|
The Hindu Group: Home | About Us | Copyright | Archives | Contacts | Subscription Group Sites: The Hindu | Business Line | The Sportstar | Frontline | Home |
Copyright © 2002, The
Hindu. Republication or redissemination of the contents of
this screen are expressly prohibited without the written consent of
The Hindu
|
