Rachita Mistry, Anuradha Biswal corner day's honours

By S. Thyagarajan

CHENNAI, JULY 30. Competitors continued to stretch their unquenchable spirit, endurance and efficiency to the optimum in an endeavour to sail into new areas of athletic excellence as another day passed into the recess of history at the inter-state athletics meet today.

The Jawaharlal Nehru Stadium once again was the theatre that witnessed a kaleidoscope of human emotions, from joy to despair, from agony to ecstasy, realisation or shattering of dreams. Maybe, the outcome was not matching the highnoon of Saturday in the matter of records, but the intensity of effort to achieve the goals was clear as crystal.

If Rachita Mistry and Anuradha Biswal mirrored the mood of happiness and satisfaction, it was despair and disillusionment for a splendid trier like Bobby Aloysius in the high jump pit that stood etched on the mind. Her dream of crossing the bar at 1.88m to make the grade disintegrated with the third attempt proving unsuccessful.

She was a picture of anguish, a pathetic figure of an athlete wronged by an insensitive and indifferent official at Bangalore that robbed her of a glorious moment of her career. The AAFI is duty bound to find a way to compensate this excellent trier, a berth for the Asian Meet at Jakarta, and if possible, to the Olympics as well.

Bobby began the assault at 1.69m and till breaking the meet record 1.84 she cleared the bar on first attempt. When raised to 1.88, there was eager expectancy in the air. She made a valiant effort to clear but failed to court success. The commiseration she received from those around the pit and from the stands only confirmed how eagerly everyone was waiting for this indefatigable athlete to reach the higher echelons of competition. Highlighting a tragic case amidst the scenes of joy may be a bit out of tune in this narration.

On the positive side, the day saw splendid hurdling by Anuradha Biswal, clocking 13.44s beating her marks both in the inter-state as well as the national.

What struck everyone in the race was the fluency with which Anuradha sailed over the hurdles without hitting a single piece from start to finish. She has been around for quite some time burning with an ambition of break the 13s barrier. An employee of NALCO in Bhuvaneshwar, Anuradha clipped 0.13s off her national record and 0.18s off the meet record.

Despite the fine effort, Anuradha felt that a better timing would have been more satisfying. Lack of challenge, she said, was the principal reason for this, although one felt she was pushed a bit by another former champion, Debi Bose who finished at 14.26s.

Expectedly, Rachita Mistry hit the tape first as the fastest woman in the meet with a time of 11.48s for a new mark, with her earlier best of 11.26s that put Usha's 11.39s in the shade awaiting official recognition. On lane three after returning the best heats time of 11.30, Rachita answered the gun a split second quicker than the rest followed by Vinita Tripathi and on lane six by Tamil Nadu's Pandeeswari. Midway through Rachitra was clearly ahead to take the top spot.

Geeta Manral completes double

References to the performance by the women athletes today will be incomplete without the mention of the double scored by the Delhi girl, Geeta Manral, who added the 800 metres to her 1500 win of Saturday. She may not be a Jyotirmoyee Sikdar as yet, but the manner in which she paced the races beating the seasoned Rosa Kutty was striking. Actually, Rosa Kutty was ahead of the pack by 20 metres before the 200 metre mark but the Karnataka veteran began to lose pace palpably even as Manral began to push herself ahead. Nearing the 300 metres from the finish, Minran made a decisive break and from there on she was a sure winner.

A runner from the hilly area of Pithorgarh of Uttar Pradesh, Geeta has made steady progress in the middle distance under the guidance and coaching of Renu Kohli. She is now with the CRPF as an inspector based in Delhi.

Anil Kumar is fastest

The tension that usually grips the competitors was very much in evidence in the men's 100 metres which Anil Kumar cornered with a time of 10.36s. Off the block first and running powerfully in the early part, Anil Kumar had to counter a stiff challenge from the US-based Tamil Nadu star, Rajeev Balakrishnan on lane five and Tamil Nadu's Thirugnanadorai on lane six. It was a close till about 10 metres but Anil Kumar forced his way ahead to the finish.

For one who reached the venue only yesterday after participating in a departmental meet, Anil's performance was quite praiseworthy. Maybe, it was way behind the 10.21s, he did in Bangalore, but the 10.36s today lowered the meet record of 10.4 by Thirugnanadorai last year. Anil Kumar admitted that his target today was flat 10 or even lower, but conceded the lack of time for practice on the track and a strong wind were factors to contend with.

Mention must also be made of the heat time of 10.35s by Ajay Raj Singh who finished fifth in the final at 10.61s.

Pramod Tiwari threw the hammer to a new meet record of 66.79 metres in the third attempt eclipsing the 67.41 by Virendra Punia set last year at Lucknow. Punia had to be content with a third place, the best effort coming in the second throw at 62.97.

In the morning, Gurdeo Singh of Punjab rewrote the walking mark for 20 km with a time of one hour, 25 minutes and 21.7 seconds pushing out the National record of Charan Singh Rathi (1:25:48s) and also the meet record of Gurdip Singh (1:33:57s).

The results:

Men: 100 metres: 1. Anil Kumar (Ker) (10.36s); 2. Rajeev Balakrishnan (TN) (10.43s); 3. Thirugnanadorai (TN) (10.49s). Meet record.

110m hurdles: 1. Gurpreet Singh (Pun) (14.49s); 2. Sahib Singh (Pun) (14.64s); 3. P.T. Yesudas (Kar) (14.68s).

20-km walk: 1. Gurdeo Singh (Pun) (1:25:21.7s); 2. Amrik Singh (Pun) (1:26:39.1s); 3. Sitaram (Raj) (1:26:45.6s). Meet and National record.

Long jump: 1. Amit Saha (Ben) (7.39m); 2. Biji Joseph (Ker) (7.31m); 3. Satish Kumar (Del) (7.30m).

Hammer throw: 1. Pramod Tiwari (UP) (66.79m); 2. Nirbhay Singh (Del) (63.46m); 3. Virendra Poonia (Raj) (62.97m).

Decathlon: 1. Dharampal (Har) (6570); 2. Barmeshwar (Bih) (6454); 3. Mandeep Kumar (MP) (6365).

Women: 100 metres: 1. Rachita Mistry (Mah) (11.48s); 2. Vinita Tripathi (Del) (11.69s); 3. V. Pandeeswari (TN) (11.81s). Meet record.

100m hurdles: 1. Anuradha Biswal (13.44s); 2. Debi Bose (Ben) (14.26s); 3. B. Poonam (Kar) (14.34s). National and meet record.

800 metres: 1. Geeta Manral (Del) (2:03.67s); 2. Ramla Devi (Pun) (2:07.71); 3. Rosa Kutty (Kar) (2.07.71s).

High jump: 1. Bobby Aloysius (Ker) (1.84m); 2. A.K. Deepa (Del) (1.72m); 3. M. Sangeetha (TN) (1.69m).

Pole vault: 1. Karamjit Kaur (Pun) (2.50m); 2. Anupama (Pun) (2.30m); 3. Minmol (Del) (2.20m).

Javelin throw: 1. Gurpreet Kaur (Del) (48.73m); 2. Monisha Mandal (Ben) (47.98m); 3. H. Indubala (Mani) (45.81m).

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