Bangalore: The bright sunshine was steadily making way for the amber glow of sunset, but S. Harshith’s hope of a standout performance was far from fading.
Pushing the excruciating pain of a pulled muscle to the back of his mind, the 19-year-old Harshith turned in an impressive performance to clinch gold with a new meet record at the National junior athletics championships, here on Wednesday.
The civil engineering student cleared a height of 2.13 metres in the boys U-20 high jump to surpass the 2.12 metre mark which was jointly held by Omvir Singh (2001) and Lakshmanan Yogaraj (2008).
At the Sree Kanteerava stadium, relegating the pre-event favourite Sreenith Mohan (2.11 metres) to the second spot, a determined Harshith stretched his physical limits and aimed for the 2.18M-mark, but could not clear it.
The meet record barely satisfied Harshith, who is returning from a hamstring injury. Even as he tried to control his tears of pain, Harshith, who set the mark on his third attempt, insisted he could have done better.
Although the lanky youngster did not match up to his personal expectations, it was heartening to see him climb back to the top, after having being dumped from the national camp following a right-foot fracture in January this year which left him struggling to find form for a while.
Earlier, Meghana Shetty handed Karnataka their first gold of the day as she justified her top billing by storming to victory in the 100 metres hurdles event in U-20.
The 18-year-old was a tad slow off the blocks, which allowed Kerala’s Mariya Juliet a chance to gun for the top slot. But the local lass recovered in time to floor the pedal at the final hurdle to come home in 14.88 metres.
Mariya had to settle for the bronze while Arya T.
(15.56) completed Kerala’s podium finish.
On the day, the hosts’ also collected a silver and two bronze.
In the boys U-20 5000M, Sriom Patel stopped the clock at 15:01.04 to claim silver, while Rahul. N. Astagi’s race time of 47:25.09 seconds saw him collect the bronze in the in the 10,000 metres walk (U-18).
In the U-18 boys’ 110M
hurdles, Santosh came up with an impressive comefrom-behind show to finish third in 14.49 seconds.
West Bengal's Swapna Barman accounted for the first national record of the event as she surpassed Kavya Muthanna's nine-year-old mark of 1.70 metres in the high jump, by a centimetre.
Meanwhile, in the boys U-20 110M hurdles morning heats, Kerala's M.N.
Nasimudheen attained the qualifying standard for the 2014 World Junior Championships with a time of 14.24 seconds.
Results Boys: UÂ 20: 5000M: 1. Rajendra Bind (UP) 14:57.61, 2. Sriom Patel (Kar) 15:01.04, 3. Albin Sunny (Ker) 15:28.43; 110M hurdles: Nasimudheen M (Ker) 14.38 sec, 2. Jashanjot Singh (Pun) 14.51, 3.
Tarundeep Singh (Pun) 14.57; High Jump: 1.Harshith.S (Kar) 2.13M (NMR), 2. Sreenith Mohan (Ker) 2.11M, 3.Rahul (Har) 2.06M.
UÂ18: 10000M walk: 1. Mahendra Singh (Guj) 44:41.28, 2.Shailesh Kumar (M.P) 44:41.35, 3.
Rahul.N.Astagi (Kar) 47:25.09; Hammer Throw: 1. Prakash Singh (UP) 65.55M, 2. Sabeel Ahmed (UP) 63.33M, 3. Vivek KR Singh (Jhar) 63.12M; 110M Hurdles: 1.Maymon Poulose (Ker) 14.16, 2.
Aftab Alam (Mah) 14.38, 3.
Santosh (Kar) 14.49; Long Jump: 1. Sirajudheen C (Ker) 7.20M, 2.
P.S.Vishnu (TN) 6.97M, 3. Abdul Hasan (UP) 6.97M.
U16: Hammer Throw: 1. Ashish Jakhar (Har) 58.72M, 2.. Mohd Arshlan (UP) 58.37M, 3. Meraj Ali (UP) 57.64M; Shot Put: 1.
Mankirat Singh (Pun) 16.14M, 2.
Saddam Hussain (Del) 16.08M, 3.
Prashanth Bahadur (UP) 15.38M; 100M Hurdles: 1. Debarajun Mur (WB) 13.35, 2. Md. Tarif (Mani) 13.50, 3.Shamnas. K (Ker) 13.69; Javelin Throw: 1. Rajesh Kumar (UP) 62.58M, 2. Vijay Lakra (Jhar) 58.06M, 3. Jay Singh (MP) 57.89M.
Girls: UÂ20: 10000M walk: 1.
Shanti Kumari (Del) 53:45.49, 2.
Meenu Yadav (UP) 56:20.50, 3.
Saroj Rani (Pun) 56:20.97; 5000M: 1. Pooja Warade (Mah) 17:40.79, 2. Thara.M.D (Ker) 18:03.75, 3.
Vibitha P.D (Ker) 18:17.03; 100M hurdles: 1.Meghana Shetty (Kar) 14.88, 2. Mariya Juliet (Ker) 15.02, 3. Arya. T (Ker) 15.56. UÂ 18: 3000M: 1. K.K.Vidhya (Ker) 10:30.56, 2. Arti Patil (Mah) 10:36.50, 3. Varsha.M.V (Ker) 10:45.71; High Jump: 1.Swapna Barman (WB) 1.71M (NMR, OR: 1.70M), 2. Juelly Badhe (Mah) 1.65M, 3. Aungkali (Nag) 1.63M.; 100M hurdles: Dibi Sebastian (Ker) 14.76, 2. Rajeshwari Bhoi (Odi) 14.78, 3. Soumya Varghese (Ker) 14.97; Javelin Throw: Gopika Narayan (Ker) 43.17M, 2.
Anju Patel (UP) 41.73M, 3.
Damayanti Murthy (Odi) 40.30M.
UÂ16: Javelin Throw: 1.Vanshika (UP) 36.35M, 2. Vishnu Priya (Ker) 31.44M, 3. Pratibha Tigga (Jhar) 30.98M; 100M hurdles: 1.
Shivangi D. Raut (Del) 15.00, 2. S.
Priyadarshini (TN) 15.00, 3.
Sayana. P.O (Ker) 15.16 sec.
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