Avinash Sable came up with a fighting finish as he pipped Eritrea’s Yemane Haileselassie to take the third spot in his 3000m steeple chase heat. The result allowed him to grab an automatic berth to the final at the World Athletics Championships here on Friday.
It is the second time national record holder Sable – who led the pack for half the race – is making the final at the Worlds after his maiden foray in Doha 2019.
Meanwhile, M. Sreeshankar became the first Indian man to qualify for the long jump final at the Worlds, finishing second in his group (with 8m) behind Olympic champion Miltiadis Tentoglou (8.03m).
Only two jumpers made the automatic qualification mark of 8.15m and Olympian Sreeshankar was seventh overall. The other two Indians, Jeswin Aldrin (7.79, 20th overall) – who was cleared by the Athletics Federation of India at the last minute after two trials – and Muhammed Anees (7.73, 23rd), failed to make the 12-man final in their debut Worlds.
There was disappointment in the men’s and women’s 20km race walk with Sandeep Kumar (1:31.58s, 40th out of 43 finishers) and Priyanka (1:39.42s, 34th out of 36 finishers) faring badly in the finals. The two have clocked faster season-best times.
TAJINDER PULLS OUT OF COMMONWEALTH GAMES
And in the men’s shot put, Asian record holder Tajinderpal Singh Toor chose to retire from the qualification round after a couple of warm-up puts. Later, he revealed to news agency PTI that he had suffered a groin injury four days ago while training at Chula Vista and that he would not be able to compete in the coming Commonwealth Games in Birmingham.
