The Hindu : Sport / Athletics : Surekha scales a new peak

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Wednesday, May 18, 2005

Sport

Sport - Athletics

Surekha scales a new peak

K.P. Mohan

NEW DELHI: V.S. Surekha scaled 3.70 metres to post a national pole vault record as she cornered all the attention in the first National circuit meet at the Nehru Stadium here on Tuesday.

The 21-year-old Southern Railway employee bettered her own record of 3.55m on way to the new height, though along the way she and Uttar Pradesh's Chetna Solanki had both gone over 3.60 metres.

The record was on expected lines, for, almost in every other meet Surekha or Chetna had been going for the record and achieving it the past few years. On Tuesday, Surekha cleared 3.60 on her second attempt to better her record achieved at last year's Open National at Mumbai and then Chetna joined her, clearing the height on her last attempt.

Surekha aimed for 3.70 and cleared in one try while Chetna bowed out of the competition, failing thrice. The Chennai girl, who hails from Trichur, then asked for the bar to be raised to 3.80, but could only manage to go through the motions before being surrounded by TV camera crews.

Surekha had actually crossed her National mark at the Railway meet here in March by scaling 3.60m but that was not taken into consideration for a National record. She had been training here for the past five months and considers Nehru stadium as her `home ground'.

Gajanan gets gold

For the first time in 18 years, a male pole vaulter touched 5.00 metres. Gajanan Upadhyay had that distinction as he took the gold in a drawn-out competition.

The `stars' from the Olympic year proved a disappointment. Manjeet Kaur, the National record holder at 51.05s, could do no better than a third place in the women's 400 metres, as Andhra's Sathi Geetha coasted to victory in 52.36s. Chitra timed 52.48 while Manjeet came in 54.03. Two of the athletes returning from doping suspensions had mixed luck. Jagdish Basak, now representing Punjab, clocked a career-best 10.48s to pip the favourite Piyush Kumar of the Railways in a photo-finish. Basak was among those suspended following steroid violation at the Hyderabad National Games in 2002.

The results:

Men: 100m: 1. Jagdish Basak (BSF) 10.48s, 2. Piyush Kumar (Rly) 10.48, 3. H. Jayachandran (LIC) 10.53; 10.52; 400m: 1. Sarish Paul (Ser) 47.31, 2. Satbir Singh (Ser) 47.32, 3. Bhupinder Singh (ONGC) 47.72; 400m hurdles: 1. P. Shankar (ONGC) 51.46s, 2. Joseph Abraham (CRPF) 51.56, 3. Kuldev Singh (Punjab Police) 52.11; High jump: 1. Benedict Starli (Rly) 2.10m, 2. Anil Kumar Chahal (Rly) 2.05, 3. Rajesh Kaliraman (Har) 2.05; Triple jump: 1. Bhupinder Singh (Punjab Police) 15.74m, 2. M. Ranjith (Rly) 15.70, 3. Amarjeet Singh (Rly) 15.61; Shot put: 1. Ranvijay Singh (U.P.) 18.85m, 2. Kuldeep Mann (CISF) 18.84, 3. Shakti Singh (Rlys.) 18.32; Discus: 1. Amritpal Singh (Pun) 51.79m, 2. Sukhbir Singh (Pun. Police) 51.06, 3. Simranjit Singh (Pun) 50.69; Hammer: 1. Kulwinder Singh (Pun. Police) 64.24m, 2. Pargat Singh (Rly) 60.83, 3. Harpal Singh (Pun. Police) 59.04; Javelin: 1. Jagdish Bishnoi (Punjab Police) 75.73m, 2. Sunil Goswami (Del) 74.66, 3. Om Narayan (Rly) 74.35.

Women: 100m: 1. Poonam Tomar (Rly) 11.55s, 2. Deepti Jose (Rly) 11.89, 3. Kavita Pandya (Rly) 11.98; 400m: 1. S. Geetha (Rly) 52.36s, 2. Chitra Soman (Jharkhand) 52.48, 3. Manjeet Kaur (Punjab Police) 54.03; 100m hurdles: 1. Anuradha Biswal (Ori) 14.50s, 2. Manju Paulose (Rly) 15.18, 3. Amita Sethi (BSNL) 15.26; Pole vault: 1. V. S. Surekha (Rly) 3.70m (NR, previous 3.55), 2. Chetna Solanki (U.P.) 3.60, 3. Geetanjali Vora (Assam) 3.40. Hammer: 1. Ritu Rani (Del) 55.50m, 2. Rajwinder Kaur (Pun) 54.00, 3. Ushma Singh (Del) 52.03.