National junior athletics: Maheshwari sets new national record in 3000m steeplechase

Maheshwari set the record in the girls under-20 3000m steeplechase clocking 10:34.10; 12.71 seconds faster than her previous best in the event.

Telangana’s G. Maheshwari set a new National record on the final day of the 35th National junior athletics championship.

Telangana’s G. Maheshwari set a new National record on the final day of the 35th National junior athletics championship at the Acharya Nagarjuna University campus here on Wednesday.

Maheshwari, who trains under SAI athletics coach N. Ramesh at the Gachibowli Stadium in Hyderabad, set the record in the girls under-20 3000m steeplechase clocking 10:34.10; 12.71 seconds faster than her previous best in the event.

Maheshwari easily secured the National Record that was pegged at 10:53.91 by Nandini Gupta in Lucknow in 2017 and the meet Record that stood at 10:55.54 in Khushboo Gupta’s name since the Mangalagiri meet in 2017.

There was something to cheer for the host State when N. Shanmuga Srinivas clinched the honours in the boys under-18 200m with a timing of 21.34 seconds, which is a meet Record, clipping 0.16 seconds off the time set by Nisar Ahmed in Ranchi last year.

Karnataka’s VA Shashikanth, who was only a hundredth’s of the winning time, had to settle for the runner-up spot like he had in the 100m on November 3. For the record, Nalubothu Shanmuga Srinivas and Shashikanth were faster than the boys under-20 200m winner, Abhin V Devadiga (Karnataka). 

The day’s other meet Record came from Uttarakhand’s Ankita in the 1500m of girls under-18 division. On a day when National Record holder Tai Hiraman Bamhane (Maharashtra) finished a distant third, Ankita was pushed by Haryana’s Pooja. She finished in 4:28.20 to erase Lili Das’s name from the record books. Lili Das had timed 4:35.40 in Ranchi in 2015.

Pratiksha Patel (Uttar Pradesh) came up with a new meet record in girls under-16 javelin throw with a 43.08m effort, breaking the old mark of 41.24 set by Jyoti in 2017. Ramyashree Jain (Karnataka) also went past Jyoti’s mark in taking second place with 41.33m in a fine duel with Pratiksha Patel.

Among the more familiar names, boys under-20 triple jumper Praveen Chithravel (Tamil Nadu) needed to bring out his best off the final jump to win gold and redeem himself. Lying third with a best effort of 15.38 after five rounds, he produced a jump of 15.85m to beat Gailey Venister (Andhra Pradesh) and Aravinth E (Tamil Nadu) to the title.