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Sport - Olympic Games

Indian athletes disappoint

Kamesh Srinivasan

BEIJING: It was a disappointing start by the Indian athletes as track and field action began in the Olympic Games at the National Stadium on Friday.

Preeja Sreedharan, the Kerala girl, whose qualification itself has been a big surprise, could not have been expected to do much in a field of classy runners from Ethiopia and Kenya and ended 25th out of 29 finishers in the women’s 10,000 metres in her second best time ever, of 32:34.64s.

It was only poorer than the National record of 32:04.41 she clocked at Watford, England, last June. Preeja was lapped twice by the leading runners, but avoided the last placing. Even if she had reproduced her National record she would have finished among the 20s only.

Hopes belied

The hype created back home, of our athletes being primed to compete in the biggest championships of all, through a systematic training programme, with a final build-up phase in Malaysia, all came to nothing on the track and field as the Indians came up with one mediocre performance after the other.

The three heptathletes in the fray, all expected to do better than what they had achieved at home, were not able to raise their level of performance to suit the occasion and trailed without any hope at the half-way stage. National record holder J. J. Shobha, who had qualified with a tally of 6043, was the best among the Indians, totalling 3482 points on the first day (100m hurdles, 13.62s; high jump 1.65m, shot put 13.07m, 200m 24.62s) for an overall place of 29th.

Pramila Aiyappa had 3419 (13.97, 1.74, 11.66, 24.92) for the 32nd place while Susmita Singha Roy had 3391 (14.11, 1.71, 11.27, 24.34) for the 34th place among 39 competitors left in the fray out of 43 starters.

Worst show

The worst, however, came from the women discus throwers, in the qualification round where Harwant Kaur ended up 17th out of 19 in her group, and 30th overall with 56.42m. Krishna Poonia finished with a 58.23m for the 10th place in her group, 24th overall, among 37 finishers in the qualifying competition. The top 12 made the final.

Harwant had registered 61.09m in the inter-State meet at Madurai to make the qualification grade, but had slumped afterwards, recording 58.58 and 58.50 in the last two Asian Grand Prix meets after having started in Bangkok with a 60.78.

Harwant had reached 60.82 metres in the Athens Olympics qualification, finishing 13th overall, just missing the final by one slot. After that there has been a lean spell, marked with a 55.55 last year. She had threatened to migrate to Australia recently if she had not been given promotions promised by her employer, the Punjab Police.

Poonia has had training stint under former Olympic champion Mac Wilkins in the U.S. this season and recorded a personal best of 63.41 metres at Salinas, California, raising hopes of a good performance in the Olympics.

But once she came back from the U.S., where she also had another good effort of 59.83 metres, she hit a downward curve in her performance, with marks of 57.57, 58.12 and 56.77 in the three Asian Grand Prix meets.

Mystery

It has always remained a mystery how the Indian athletes perform at world-class levels in meets before a big event and then disappoint on the all-important stage. Sydney and Athens had shown such a phenomenon and here we were witness to it once again.

At one time, the federation was hopeful of entering three women discus throwers in the Olympics, but Neelam J Singh, back from a doping ban, could never come close to the qualifying marks (‘A’ standards 61m, ‘B’ standard 59), while Seema Antil, on whom much hopes were pinned, also failed to make the cut.

On Saturday, Vikas Gowda will be seen in action in the men’s discus qualification round while Mandeep Kaur, who has recorded a personal best of 51.74 seconds this season, will be figuring in the women’s 400m heats.

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