Anirudha, Dutee emerge fastest; Jyothi settles for silver medal

 Anirudha Gujar of LIC and Dutee Chand of ONGC notched up convincing victories in the 100M events while Railways’ Merlin Joseph rewrote a 13-year-old national record on the second day of the 53rd Open National athletics championships here on Sunday.

Merlin timed a stunning 11.35 seconds to erase Rachita Mistry’s mark of 11.38 set in the year 2000 in the women’s 100M semifinals but she could only finish third in the final in 11.95 seconds. Dutee, with an 11.73-second dash, claimed the gold while Karnataka’s H M Jyothi, making a comeback after motherhood, clocked 11.87 seconds for the silver.

Gujar, winner of the Inter-State title in June, timed 10.46 seconds to win the men’s 100M by a big margin from Tamil Nadu’s S Sathya (10.66) and ONGC’s Abdul Najeeb Qureshi (10.67).

Railways’ Tintu Luka retained the women’s 800M gold while Sajeesh Joseph, another Railways’ runner, extended his reign in the men’s 800M. Sajeesh timed 1:49.50 for his third straight title and fifth overall.

Tintu clocked her season’s best of 2:01.87 to finish ahead of Sushma Devi (2:03.11) and Sini A Markose (2:03.51).

In men’s long jump, LIC’s Ankit Sharma upset the fancied Kumarvel Premkumar for the gold. Ankit leapt to 7.73 metres in the first round and fouled all his subsequent jumps. Premkumar, who has a best of 8.09 metres, was bothered by a hamstring strain and could manage only 7.62.

In the men’s 100M, Karnataka’s G N Bopanna bowed out in the semifinals, timing 10.89 seconds.

Results: Men: 100M: Anirudha Gujar (LIC) 10.46 seconds, 1; S Sathya (Tamil Nadu) 10.66, 2; Abdul Najeeb Qureshi (ONGC) 10.67, 3.
800M: Sajeesh Joseph (Railways) 1:49.50, 1; Manjeet Singh (ONGC) 1:49.51, 2; Jinson Johnson (Services) 1:50.26, 3.
Long jump: Ankit Sharma (LIC) 7.73 metres, 1; K Premkumar (Railways) 7.62, 2; Raja Oommen (Kerala) 7.37, 3.
Shot put: Om Prakash Singh (ONGC) 18.67, 2; Inderjeet Singh (Haryana) 18.58, 2; Jasdeep Singh (ONGC) 17.97, 3.
Javelin throw: Ravinder Singh (Chandigarh) 75.47 metres, 1; Dinesh Kumar Rao (Rajasthan) 74.62, 2; Rajendra Singh (Railways) 72.88, 3.
Decathlon: Daya Ram (Services) 6812 points, 1; Raneesh V V (Railways) 6742, 2; Ajay Yadav (Services) 6576, 3.
Women: 100M: Dutee Chand (ONGC) 11.73 seconds, 1; H M Jyothi (Karnataka) 11.87, 2; Merlin K Joseph (Railways) 11.95, 3.
800M: Tintu Luka (Railways) 2:01.87, 1; Sushma Devi (Railways) 2:03.11, 2; Sini A Markose (ONGC) 2:03.51, 3.
High jump: Reena (Police) 1.70 metres, 1; Siji N K (Railways) and Mallika Mondal (Railways) 1.65, 2.
20000M walk: Khushbir Kaur (ONGC) 1:45:21, 1; Ranjana Gupta (Police) 1:48:00, 2; Rani Yadav (Railways) 1:52:36, 3.