Jyothika and Sherin hog the limelight in National under-23 athletics championship
The Hindu
Shashikanth and Taranjeet emerge as fastest athletes
The search is on for young quartermilers to strengthen the Indian women’s relay team for next year’s Commonwealth Games, Asian Games and Worlds. And Dandi Jyothika Sri, who had run the quartermile and mixed relay at the 2017 under-18 Worlds, produced an impressive 53.05s for the 400m gold in the first National under-23 athletics championships at the Nehru Stadium in New Delhi on Tuesday.
Her time is the second fastest by an Indian this year, behind Priya H. Mohan’s 52.77s which came at the recent under-20 Worlds.
Jyothika’s run was a dominating one and the 21-year-old from Andhra Pradesh finished more than 1.5s ahead of Jharkhand’s Florence Barla. She entered this year with a personal best of 54.70s and clocked 55.98s (inter-State) and 54.83 (National Open) in her last two competitions.
Unlike most of the Olympic-bound athletes, who opt to train abroad before the big event, boxer Amit Panghal prefers training in home conditions prior to Paris 2024. A former World championships silver medallist and a World No. 1, Panghal won the 51kg quota place in the only chance he got. He wants to follow his own plans to script success in Paris.
The other men’s semifinal Friday is Norway’s Casper Ruud, twice the runner-up in Paris — to Rafael Nadal in 2022 and to Novak Djokovic in 2023 — against Germany’s Alexander Zverev, a finalist at the 2020 U.S. Open, an Olympic gold medalist and into the final four at Roland Garros for the fourth consecutive year.