Trying to understand her sport better has brought rich rewards for Annu Rani this season. The 27-year-old has been one of the most consistent athletes this season and a few days ago, she made history by becoming the first Indian woman to enter the javelin throw final at the World championships in Doha.
After a long season that saw her produce a series of 60m throws and a national record 62.43m at the Doha Worlds, Rani was a comfortable winner at the 59 National Open Athletics Championships which began at the Birsa Munda Stadium here on Thursday.
“I tried to analyse my throws, tried to understand where I was going wrong and tried to improve on them. That helped me immensely,” said the Asian silver medallist after her winning effort of 58.60m.
“And I tried to learn as much as I could from the world's top throwers. I am confident I can do the 64m to qualify for the Olympics next year, Tokyo is my big target.”
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An hour before Rani's winning throw, Asian Games champion Tajinderpal Singh Toor broke Inderjeet Singh's meet record (19.82) with a 19.89m effort in the men's shot put qualification round. Despite being given a four-year suspension for a 2016 doping violation in a case that went all the way to the Court of Arbitration for Sport, Inderjeet's figured in the startlist last night but was removed later. According to sources, he was present at the stadium today.
Meanwhile Services' S. Siva, equalled his own men's pole-vault meet record clearing 5.10m and later in the evening, Railway's Bhairabi Roy edged out Haryana's Renu by one centimetre to take the women's triple jump title.
Arjun Munda, Union Tribal Affair Minister and former Chief Minister of Jharkhand, inaugurated the four-day championship.
The results (finals):
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