Bangkok, July 15: Star Indian long jumper Murali Sreeshankar on Saturday became the first Indian track and field athlete to qualify for the 2024 Paris Olympics after winning a silver medal in the Asian Athletics Championships with a second career-best effort of 8.37m here.
The 24-year-old Sreeshankar achieved the Olympic qualification with his final round jump of 8.37m on the fourth and penultimate day of the continental showpiece. The Paris Games mark is 8.27m and the qualification period began on July 1.
Yu Tang Lin of Chinese Taipei won the gold with a fourth round jump of 8.40m, which is the third best effort in the world this season.
India also clinched a gold medal on the day as the mixed 4x400m relay team ran a national record time of 3 minute and 14.70 seconds, while Sarvesh Anil Kushare and Swapna Barman added a silver each in men’s high jump and heptathlon respectively.
The 400m hurdler Santhosh Kumar secured the lone bronze medal for India on the day.
With one gold, three silver and a bronze won Saturday, India has now won 14 medals (6 gold, 4 silver and 4 bronze).
Four 20km race walkers – Akshadeep Singh, Vikas Singh and Paramjeet Singh Bisht in men’s event and Priyanka Goswami in women’s event – have already qualified for the Paris Olympics. But race walk is a road event in the Olympics.
The Paris Olympics qualifying period for 10,000m, combined events (decathlon and heptathlon), race walks and relays is from December 31, 2022 to June 30, 2024 while for marathon race, it is from November 1, 2022 to April 30, 2024.
The qualifying period for all other events is from July 1, 2023 to June 30, 2024.
Sreeshankar will be competing in his second Olympics. He was eliminated in the qualification round in the Tokyo Games.
Sreeshankar, who entered the exclusive three-member Indian club of Diamond League medal winners in Paris last month, was the favourite to win the gold here. He was leading midway the event with his third jump of 8.12m but his Chinese Taipei opponent took the lead in the fourth round with 8.40m and held on to it till the end.
Sreeshankar, who had won a bronze in the 2022 Commonwealth Games, has already qualified for the Budapest World Championships in August with his career-best and world second-ranked jump of 8.41m during the qualification round of the National Inter-State Championships last month.
No Indian has ever won a long jump gold in the Asian Championships after TC Yohannan stood on the top of the podium in the 1975 edition. The last Indian long jumper to win a medal was K Prem Kumar who bagged a silver in 2013.
Kushare cleared 2.26m for his high jump silver but failed in his three attempts for 2.28m. Competing two days after winning a bronze in decathlon, Tejaswin Shankar, who holds the high jump national record of 2.29m, could only clear 2.10m to finish seventh.
T Woo Sanghyeok of Korea took the gold by clearing 2.28m.
The injury-prone 26-year-old Barman accumulated 5840 points from the seven events competed over two days. Ekaterina Veronina of Uzbekistan won gold with a total of 6098 points.
Barman had won heptathlon gold in 2017 Asian Championships, gold in the 2018 Asian Games and a silver in 2019 Asian Championships.
Santhosh clocked a personal best time of 49.09 seconds – the fastest time by an Indian in men’s 400m hurdles this year. He finished behind gold medal winner Mohammed Hemeida Bassem (48.64 seconds) of Qatar and Yusaku Kodama (48.96) of Japan.
The 25-year-old’s previous best was 49.49 which he had clocked last year.
No Indian has ever won a men’s 400m hurdles gold in Asian Championships.
Joseph Abraham’s silver in 2009 edition was the best performance by an Indian while he also won a bronze in 2007. M P Jabir won a bronze each in the last two editions. (PTI)
