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India disappoints in Athletics: Shakti, Paramjit crash out
Indian shot putter Shakti Singh and quarter-miler Paramjit Singh performed far below their best and crashed out at the Olympic Games athletics championship which started in Sydney today.
National men`s shot put record holder Shakti Singh
finished a lowly 17th in group a of the qualifying round, by
hurling the iron ball to a distance of 20.09 m, and failed to advance.
John Godina, who hurled the shot to 20.58 m, led the
field in group a with-fellow American Adam Nelson following
him with a 20.12 m effort.
The minimum distance needed for qualifying was 20.10 m.
Paramjit Singh, who had lowered the long-standing
400m national record of `flying sikh` Milkha Singh a couple
of years ago, also turned in a disappointing run in the
men`s one-lap race and clocked 46.64 secs while finishing
sixth in the first round heat 6.
He was off his national mark by almost a full second
and also failed to qualify for the second round. Nine heats
were conducted in the first round with the top three
in each heat and the next five fastest making it to the
next round.
The other Indian in fray in shot put, Bahadur Singh also
made his exit from the event.
Placed in Group B, Bahadur logged a distance of
18.70 metres and was eliminated.
The group winner was Arsi Harju of Finland (21.39m),
followed by Ukrainian Yuriy Bilonog (20.53m).
On the other hand world champions Maurice Greene and
Michael Johnson left the opening session of Olympic track with a smile today. Czech 800 metre champion Ludmila Formanova
hobbled off with a grimace.
Formanova dropped out of her heat when an old foot injury
acted up again.
“I wanted to break the physical pain barrier because the
whole season I have been preparing for the Olympics,” she
said.
Once into the second lap, the pain became unbearable as
the swelling in her left ankle got worse.
In the 100, Greene breezed to an easy victory in 10.31
seconds in his first-round heat today, then strutted and
waved to the crowd. He slowed significantly toward the end of
his heat.
Greene, who holds the world record of 9.79 seconds,
failed to qualify for the 1996 Olympics and drove 18 hours
from his home in Kansas City to Atlanta to see the Games.
During the 100m final, he sat in the stands and cried
uncontrollably.
Bureau Report