Tehran (Iran) – 17 FEB 2024:
Indian shot putter Tajinderpal Singh Toor and Kazakh hurdler David Yefremov successfully retained their titles on the first day of the 11th Asian Indoor Athletics Championships here on Saturday.
Athletes from India and China took three titles each from eight titles decided today. Besides Yefremov, Kyrgyzstan distance runner Kenenshbekov Nursultan was the only other athlete to clinch a gold medal through his victory in 1500m.
Women athletes opened the medals hunt in the morning:
The competitions for women were conducted separately in the morning session while the men’s events were held in the evening. For women, it was a closed-door affair with no men allowed to view their competitions as per the law of the host country.
China’s reigning Asian Games champion Xiong Shiqi and former World U18 bronze medalist Sun Yue brought China the coveted gold in the Long Jump and Shot Put respectively. In the long jump, the silver medal also went to another Chinese Tan Mengqyi. Shiqi’s winning jump of 6.55m was her best in the indoors.
The first track medal of the day went to India’s Harmilan Kaur Bains as she effortlessly took the top spot in 1500m clocking 4:29.55, the slowest winning time for this event in the championships’ history. Harmilan, who holds the national record at 4:05.39, could have easily breached her country-mate Sinimol Paulose’s meet mark and indoor national best of 4:15.42 had there been anyone to push her.
However, Indian hurdler Jyothi Yarraji brought the surprise of the day by winning the 60m hurdles. As expected, Japan’s Asuka Terada led the qualifiers with a time of 8.18 secs from the second heat of the day while Jyothi won the other in 8.22 secs. But Jyothi was quick to respond to the starter’s gun in the final to clock a decent 8.12 secs to pocket the gold. Terada could manage only 8.21s for the silver ahead of Lui Lai Yu (8.26s) from Hong Kong, China. It was a one-up for Jyothi from her last year’s silver medal in Astana.
Yefremov defends the title and equaled the meet mark:
Although no meet records improved on the first day, the final event of the day–the men’s 60m hurdles–saw the equaling of the meet mark by Kazakhstan’s David Yefremov.
The Kazakh revealed his ambitions of retaining his crown from the previous edition while clocking 7.66 secs to win his opening heat, which was just a shade away from his last year’s winning time (7.65s) in Astana.
The final saw a brilliant line-up with two Chinese, Ning Xiaohan and Qin Weibo, both winners of the other two qualifying heats as also John Cabang from the Philippines. There was a false start by Salih Kadhim Naser of Iraq, who clocked 7.82 secs to finish second behind Xiaohan in the heats. When the race was finally on, Weibo briefly took the lead before Yefremov jumped into action to freeze the frame in 7.60 secs — a time that equaled the meet record of Abdulaziz Al-Mandeel, an excellent Kuwaiti hurdler since 2016.
Weibo (7.63) and Cabang (7.64) filled the other places on the podium,
Tajinderpal retains the title, but narrowly misses the mark:
Indian shot putter Tajinderpal Singh Toor was the other athlete to defend his title from Astana successfully. His opening throw was declared void. Iran’s Mehdi Saberi, who won a silver medal in last year’s Asian championships in Bangkok behind Toor, heaved the iron ball to 18.74m and led the fray at the end of the first round. However, the experienced Indian who held the Asian Record with a tall 21.77m, bounced back in the second round to lodge 19.72m — a mark that turned out to be the gold-winning throw. It was indeed an improved show for Toor when compared to his performance in Astana (19.49m). He missed the meet mark (19.78m by Zhang Jun, China, 2012) by just 6 cm, yet improved the Indian indoor best of 19.60m by Vikas Gowda set way back in 2005.
Kazakhstan’s Ivan Ivanov finally won the Asian indoor medal, a silver, which eluded him since his first appearance in 2012 by tossing the ball to 19.08m. Saberi’s first-round mark fetched him the bronze.
Chinese long jumper Zhang Mingkun put out an improved display to win the event with a leap of 7.97m. The Astana bronze medalist was trailing in the fifth position until the fifth round when he produced the gold-winning jump. Japan’s Daiki Oda, the early leader with 7.76m, missed out on the silver to his compatriot Yuto Toriumi (7.89m). Another Chinese medal contender Shi Yuhao (7.75) also lost his grip after the fifth round decided the fate of the medalists in the pit.
Keneshbekov Nursultan, the 2023 World University Games bronze medalist in 5000m, won Kyrgyzstan’s first-ever Asian indoor medal in 1500m. Fourth at last year’s Asian championships in Bangkok, Nursultan clocked 3:49.10 for the gold in Tehran. Before his achievement today, Kyrgyzstan’s best-ever show in this event was a fifth-place finish by Musulman Dzholomanov when Tehran hosted the championships in 2018. Qatar’s Abdulrahman Saeed Hassan (3:49.31) and Iranian Ali Amirian (3:49.33) were the other two medalists in this event.
Ram. Murali Krishnan for Asian Athletics
