India won three gold and two bronze medals on the second day of the Asian Athletics Championships on Thursday. Jyothi Yarraji, Abdulla Aboobacker and Ajay Kumar Saroj won the golds, while Tejaswin Shankar and Aishwarya Misha bagged bronzes.
Jyothi opened India's gold medal account in the championships in the women's 100m hurdles. The 23-year-old dipped under the 13s mark for the fifth time this year in the semifinal and clocked 13.09s in the final ahead of Japan's runners Terada Asuka (13.13s) and Aoki Masumi (13.26s).
Though it was a tad slower than her best, it was a commendable performance from Jyothi considering the rain made the conditions very tricky. "I was in very good shape, and I thought today would be my day and I would be able to do my personal best. But suddenly rain came down and because of that my timing was not that good," she said.
"I was leading at the fifth hurdle, the sixth one was good, but I slipped a bit in the seventh hurdle. That also was the reason for my timing not going below 13 seconds," Jyothi said after the race.
@JyothiYarraji bags the 1⃣st��for ���� at the ongoing Asian Athletics Championships 2023 ��
The #TOPSchemeAthlete clocked a time of 13.09s in Women's 100m Hurdles Event.
Meanwhile, her counterpart Nithya Ramaraj clocked 13.55s & finished 4⃣th at the event. pic.twitter.com/WPGCcHHoOM
- SAI Media (@Media_SAI) July 13, 2023
In the men's 1500m, 26-year-old Ajay ran a timed his race to perfection as he surged on in the final bend and dug deep to race past his opponents in the final 80 meters. He clocked 3:41.51 seconds, two and half seconds outside his personal best of 3:39.19 which he had recorded last month in an event in the USA.
It was the third medal on the trot and second gold for Saroj, who had trained in the USA in May, in the Asian Athletics Championships. He won gold in the 2017 edition in Bhubaneswar and silver in 2019 in Doha. Saroj said he knew there were two or three tough competitors, and his strategy was to follow them before making the final kick at the last stretch.
"Because of my training in the USA (Colorado Springs) earlier this year (under Scott Simmons), I have come here with confidence. There was the Qatari runner and two Japanese runners who can run in the range of 3:37 and 3:38. So, my strategy was to follow them till just before the end. I preserve myself and was able to make the final kick in the final stretch. My aim was to win the gold and not much on timing," he said.
Commonwealth Games silver medallist Aboobacker added a third gold when he won the men's triple jump event. He recorded a season's best and effort of 16.92m to win gold, which also was his career's fourth-best jump. The 27-year-old began with a foul but cleared 16.92m in his fourth attempt for the gold. "Because of rain, the (jumping) board was moving. Still, I was confident of doing well and I was able to do that finally," said Aboobacker, who has a personal best of 17.19m.
PODIUM FINISH! ��#TeamIIS athlete Tejaswin Shankar picks up Bronze in the Decathlon event at the Asian Athletics Championships, with a tally of 7527 points. ��#AsianAthletics #CraftingVictories ���� pic.twitter.com/UajELZJFy9
- Inspire Institute of Sport (@IIS_Vijayanagar) July 13, 2023
Quartermiler Aishwarya (53.07s) and Tejaswin were the other medal-winning Indians on the day, with a bronze in the women's 400m final and gruelling men's decathlon. Aishwarya said she made a mistake of exerting more than necessary in the initial part of her race and she was left with little energy in the final stretch. "This is my first international event and so I made the mistake. The rhythm was also lacking but I will learn with experience," she said.
Tejaswin accumulated 7527 points, which is lesser than the 7576 he had totalled while winning gold in the National Inter-State Championships last month but registered personal best efforts in discus throw and javelin throw.
"I need further improvement in shot put, pole vault, discus throw and javelin. But I need more competition and more exposure. I am in the decathlon for just one year while my competitors here have been doing it for years," he said.