CHENNAI: The weather has cleared. Rain has given way to bright sunshine and conditions at the Nehru Stadium look perfect for action to begin in the National inter-State athletics championships scheduled from November 2 to 5. The Chennai Port Trust Sports Board has come forward to conduct the event.

A token start was, however, made on Wednesday itself with the 10,000m run in both the men's and women's sections under floodlights. From Thursday the proceedings will be under lights mostly.

With the Doha Asian Games just a month away and this being the final opportunity for those aspiring to catch the eye, the very best performers from the Indian athletics scene are ready to give their best. As W.I. Davaram, President, Tamil Nadu Athletic Association, said while briefing the media, "this is the last opportunity for those who have attained qualification marks and those on the border lines to confirm their berths."

Qualifiers

As per the Athletic Federation of India's list, the following have touched the qualifying norms so far: men: Vikas Gowda (shot put, discus), Navpreet Singh (shot put), Harishankar Roy (high jump), A. Arvind, Anil Kumar, Vilas Neelagund, Vishal Saxena, Ajay, Sandeep Sarkaria (4x100m relay); Bhupinder Singh, Satbir Singh, Joseph Abraham, P.S. Sreejith, P. Shankar and Vinish (4x400m relay); women: Anju Bobby George (long jump), J.J. Shobha, Soma Biswas, Susmita Singha (heptathlon), Seema Antil, Krishna Poonia (discus), Manjeet Kaur (400m), Pinki Paramanik (400m, 800m), S. Shanthi (800m, 1500m), Manjeet Kaur, Pinki Paramanik, Chitra K. Soman, S. Geetha, Ashik Beevi, H.M. Jyothi (4x400m relay). The AFI has however not mentioned what the norms have been and as for the `relay qualification' no trials have been held so far.

Missing names

The list does not carry the names of C. Hamza (800m), O.P. Jaisha (1500m), Sinimole Paulose (1500m), all of whom had performed within the established norms (Asian Games or Asian track and field third place).

Mr. Davaram said that Anju would be competing in triple jump too. He said there would also be interest as to how Railway girl V.S. Sureka performs in pole vault. She has a 4.08m performance to her name and going by the third-place criterion, she has to clear 4.10m for qualifying (it is understood, however, that AFI has raised that to 4.20m). Just as the athletes go through their business there is also expected to be action off the field in the form of dope testing. "All medal winners will be tested apart from those randomly selected," Mr. Davaram said.

The results: 10,000 m: men: 1. Surendra Singh (Uttaranchal) (29:30.86); 2. Santosh Kumar Patel (UP) (30:12.64); 3. Sita Ram (Jharkand) (30:27.97); women: 1. Preeja Sreedharan (Ker) (34:30.77); 2. Preethi L. Rao (TN) (35:41.77); 3. Madhuri Gurnule (Mah) (37:15.10).

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