Hima Das wins 200m gold in her first race after greater than a yr

Star Indian sprinter Hima Das ran her first aggressive race in additional than a yr and gained a gold within the girls”s 200m within the Indian Grand Prix II on the Netaji Subhas National Institute of Sports campus right here on Thursday.
The 21-year-old Hima, the 2018 world junior champion in 400m, gained the race in 23.31 seconds.
She ran sooner solely thrice earlier on this distance — twice in 2018 when she clocked 23.10 seconds within the National Inter-State Athletics Championships in Guwahati and 23.22 seconds in a Grand Prix meet in Poland and as soon as in 2019 when she clocked 23.25 seconds in Czech Republic.
Hima, who’s but to qualify for the upcoming Tokyo Olympics, had run her final aggressive race in August 2019. She had suffered a decrease again damage on the 2018 Asian Games and that pressured her to overlook the World Championships in Doha in September 2019.
After that COVID-19 pandemic struck and all the home calendar was worn out, no Indian athlete might participate in any occasion overseas.
Sprinter Dutee Chand blazed the observe to win the ladies”s 100m in 11.44 seconds, an enchancment on the 11.51 seconds she had clocked final week within the first GP. She is hoping to qualify for the Olympic Games by assembly the 11.15 seconds customary.
She also can qualify as one of many 56 starters within the Tokyo Games on the premise of her rankings. She is world no. 33 in the mean time.
In the lads”s 400m, Amoj Jacob of Delhi got here up with a private greatest time of 46.00 seconds to win the race.
Two of his relay squad team-mates, Arokia Rajiv (Tamil Nadu) and Muhammed Anas Yahiya (Kerala), had been locked in an interesting contest over the 200m dash. Rajiv defeated Anas, who holds the nationwide report, by 0.20 seconds, with a time of 21.24 seconds.
Kerala”s M Sreeshankar, competing in his first national-level lengthy lump competitors since October 2019, produced a greatest leap of 8.05m on his sixth attempt to win the gold.
He would have been happy along with his rhythm that fetched him jumps between 7.75m and seven.87m and egged by that, he went over the 8m mark to have a promising begin to the season.
In the lads”s shot put, Tajinderpal Singh”s opening effort of 19.49m was adequate for the gold.
Javelin thrower Annu Rani of Uttar Pradesh, who was looking for Olympic qualifying mark of 64.00m, delivered a 61.22m throw along with her opening effort to win the gold.