Impressive show by Chaoba, Lenindro

By Our Special Correspondent

NEW DELHI, APRIL 19. The long process of filtering out the qualifiers for the individual pursuit and sprint events in two sessions produced only a couple of impressive timings in the National cycling championship at the Yamuna Velodrome here on Wednesday.

With no medal at stake during the day, most cyclists concentrated on qualifying for the tougher rounds ahead. The two exceptions were Manipur's N. Chaoba Devi and H. Lenindro Singh, both of whom returned fairly good timings while heading their state's 1-2 in their respective individual pursuit events over two kilometres. Choaba clocked 3:10.28 minutes to head the list for semifinalists in the girls' (under-18) section over while Lenindro took 2:48.49.

For a place in the final, Chaoba faces Kerala's Sheetal V.S. and Manipur's H. Dinita Devi meets Maharashtra's Sonali Patil. Similarly, Lenindro will clash with Punjab's Gurmeet Singh before Manipur's L. Budha Singh will take on Maharashtra's Uttam Nale.

Meanwhile, Railway's injured cyclist Jafferson Singh put Tuesday's crash behind and returned to the track to qualify for the semifinals of the men's 4-km individual pursuit. Jafferson's 5:30.05 was enough to set up a semifinal clash with teammate and top qualifier Jeeta Ram, who clocked 5:25.56. The other finalist will emerge from the face-off between Rajasthan's Ramkaran Chaudhary, who is more of a road rider, and Services' Jorawar Singh.

lThe results (qualifying rounds):

Men: 4-km individual pursuit: 1. Jeeta Ram (Rlys) 5:25.56; 2. Ramkaran Chaudhary (Raj) 5:29.10; 3. Jorawar Singh (Ser) 5:29.20; 4. Jafferson Singh (Rlys) 5:30.05.

Boys (under-18): 3-km individual pursuit: 1. Harsimran Singh Brar (Chand) 4:14.48; 2. N. Budha Singh (Mani) 4:15.90; 3. M. Premchand Singh (Mani) 4:20.50; 4. Nazar Singh (Pun) 4:24.36.

Boys (under-16): 2-km individual pursuit: 1. H. Lenindro Singh (Mani) 2:48.49; 2. L. Budha Singh (Mani) 2:50.09; 3. Uttam Nale (Mah) 2:53.60; 4. Gurmeet Singh (Pun) 2:56.00.

Women: 3-km individual pursuit: 1. Rameshwori Devi (Mani) 4:29.40; 2. O. Bina Devi (Mani) 4:37.59; 3. R. Seema (Ker) 4:50.84; 4. Anitha Andrews (Ker) 4:50.84.

Girls (under-18): 2-km individual pursuit: 1. N. Chaoba Devi (Mani) 3:10.28; 2. H. Dinita Devi (Mani) 3:14.87; 3. Sonali Patil (Mah) 3:23.58; 4. Sheetal V.S. (Ker) 3:27.08.

Girls (under-16): 2-km individual pursuit: 1. K. Naocha (Mani) 3:23.02; 2. Gurpreet Kaur (Pun) 3:24.90; 3. Pratina Lonari (Mah) 3:26.30; 4. T. Neeta Devi (Mani) 3:26.31.

N. Chaoba Devi of Manipur, who topped the list for semifinals in the girls' under-18 individual pursuit.

Manipur's H. Lenindro Singh returned with impressive timings in the under-16 qualifying event of the individual pursuit in the National cycling championship in New Delhi on Wednesday.

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