Bhubaneswar, June 25 (IANS) Star sprinters, Animesh Kujur and Unnathi Bollanda, booked their berths to the upcoming Asian Games in Aichi-Nagoya, Japan, achieving the qualifying marks in the respective 200m races in the 65th National Senior Inter-State Athletics Championships at the Kalinga Stadium in Bhubaneswar on Thursday.

While Animesh and Unnathi sprinted past the qualifying mark on the track, Sindhushree G came up with a record-breaking leap of 4.25 metres to set a new National Record in the women’s pole vault. Sindhushree improved on the record held by Rosy Meena Paulraj, who soared to 4.21m on October 15, 2022, in the Indian Championships in Bengaluru.

Baranica Flangovan joined Sindhushree on the Asian Games-bound flight by achieving the qualifying mark in the women’s Pole Vault. She cleared 4.20m on Thursday to book her ticket to Japan for the Asian Games starting on September 19.

Animesh Kujur clocked 20.87 seconds in the Men’s 200M semifinals and booked his ticket for the Asian Games 2026 on Thursday. Later, in the 200m final, Kujur won the gold medal in 20.74 seconds to finish first.

In the corresponding women’s 200m, Unnathi Bollanda delivered a stunning run to book her place for the Asian Games 2026 by clocking 23.658 seconds. Harita clocked 23.55s in the Women’s 200m and punched her ticket to the Asian Games.

A day after Jyothi Yarraji made the qualifying mark, Tejas Shirse qualified for the Asian Games, clocking 13.43s in the men’s 110m hurdles at the National Inter-State Senior Athletics Championships, breaching the Asian Games qualifying mark of 13.63s.

In the Men’s Decathlon, Thowfeeq N of Kerala claimed the gold medal with 7276 points, finishing ahead of Kushal Mohite of Maharashtra (7251 pts), who took the silver medal. Both cleared the Asian Games qualification mark of 7250 points in a nail-biting finish.

Two athletes breached the 16.25m mark in the Women’s Shot Put in Bhubaneswar. Manpreet Kaur of Haryana and Srishti Vig of Delhi joined Krishna Jayasankar in clearing the Asian Games qualification standard in this event.

On Wednesday, extraordinary performances by three talented athletes—pole vaulter Dev Meena, teenage hammer thrower Anuskha Yadav, and sprinter-cum-hurdler Jyothi Yarraji—further brightened Bhubaneswar’s floodlit Kalinga Stadium on the opening day.

The three extraordinary performances were the highlights of the evening session of the meet, which started on an exciting note, as several athletes achieved qualification marks in their respective events for the 2026 Asian Games to be held at Aichi–Nagoya in Japan.

–IANS

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