Track legend Usha surprised by Ashwini’s progress
Tintu on the road to recovery from hamstring strain, says coach
Athletics legend P T Usha has expressed surprise over the sudden improvement that powered A C Ashwini to gold medal in the 400M hurdles at the Asian Games last month.
“Ashwini was an 800M runner and two years back. Suddenly, she has jumped from 57 to 53 seconds in 400M. The 400M career graph is not like that. She has good height and great talent. But when she came to the national camp with the Ukraine group, her performance saw a sudden jump,” said Usha, who was in Bangalore as the chief guest at Samhita Academy’s sports meet on Saturday.
Ashwini had clocked 56.15 seconds to win the gold medal in Guangzhou and also starred in India’s victory in the 4x400M relay a day later.
“At the Commonwealth Games he clocked 59.49 seconds in hurdles. After one month, when she went to China for the Asian Games, from 59 plus she jumped to 56.1s. I can't comment on her future. But she shouldn't go back to 59. If she stays in 56 and maintains the tempo, it would be good for her,” said Usha, who holds the national record in the event at 55.42 seconds, clocked at the 1984 Los Angeles Olympic Games.
Usha said shifting from 400M to 400M hurdles was not that easy.
“I took up hurdles (internationally) in 1984, the Olympic year. But I was a hurdler in my college days and was a university champion in 100M hurdles. Also, I was 80M hurdles record holder in Nationals. I had good sprint and stride and I improved my 400M career graph slowly. I started with 53.6 and came to 51.6 gradually and only then I started hurdling. It was easy for me because I was a hurdler before and then I did 55.42,” said the track legend, who had missed the bronze by one-hundredths of a second then.
Usha felt staying in hurdles would help Ashwini in the future. “There is no problem if she continues in hurdles. She can improve her 400M timing as well. 400M hurdles will help her 400M flat.”
Usha said her ward Tintu Luka is on the road to recovery after injuring her hamstring in the 800M final at Guangzhou, where she won the bronze medal.
“She is under treatment and taking rest now. I want her to be back on the track in one month's time because there is the Asian Championships in July and Worlds in August/September. From next year onwards, we are planning at least six races a year abroad for Tintu.
“She should run more 800M races so that she would be more confident going into the Worlds. In our country, people are impatient and they want gold medals right from the start (of one's career). In 800M, we won't achieve something big in just one or two years. She should run more races. In 2008, Tintu finished ninth in the Poland junior meet. The eight who finished ahead of her have still not run under two minutes.”
