Saturday Nov 16, 2024
Saturday Nov 16, 2024
Wednesday, 20 September 2017 00:00 - - {{hitsCtrl.values.hits}}
By Hishan Welmilla in Ashgabat
The Sri Lankan athletes had a busy schedule on day three of the Asian Indoor and Martial Arts Games (AIMAG 2017), which took place today in Ashgabat, Turkmenistan.
First up in action was Himasha Eashan in the men’s 60 metres dash in the indoor athletics events in the athletics arena. Eashan competed in the fourth heat out of eight heats lined up for the day and finished third with a time of 6.89 seconds and qualified for the semifinals which were scheduled for 6.00 p.m. on the same day.
Yonglian Huang of China placed first (6.76 secs) while Reza Ghasemi (6.86 secs) secured second place ahead of Eashan. The first three finishers from each heat and the next six fastest runners will qualify for the semifinals.
Eashan ran in the third semifinal and had tough competition in the semifinals from Hassan Taftian (Iran), Abdullah Abkar (Saudi Arabia), Alisar Sadulavew (Turkmenistan) and Vladislaw Girigorev (Kazakhstan) who had a better time than him.
The three other Sri Lankans in action on Tuesday (19) were Vidusha Lakshani, Indunil Herath and Amila Jayasiri. Lakshani competed in the women’s triple jump finals, which was declared a straight gold medal event due to a lack of participants. The men’s long jump event also became a final medal event with Sri Lankan Jayasiri participating in the event, which started at 7.00 p.m. local time (7.30 p.m. Sri Lanka time).
Sri Lankan medal hopeful Herath was seen in action in the men’s 800 metre semifinals. Herath ran the second of the two semifinals. His season’s best was one minute 49.21 seconds and the only competitor who ran the semifinal in a time close to Hearath’s was Khurshidjo Akhmadaliev of Uzbekistan (1.51.89) on the start list of the day.
Jayasiri competed in the men’s long jump medal event with 18 other competitors. Jayasiri had recorded a distance of 8.15 metres as his best performance while he notched up 7.83 meters as his season’s best performance. From all the competitors who lined up for the event , apart from Jayasiri only one athlete had gone over 8 meters as a personal best - Ming Tai of Hong Kong who recorded 8.12 meters as his personal and season’s best.
Manjula Kumara will compete in his pet event, the men’s high jump, which is a medal event which will get underway today (20). Thirteen competitors have been lined up for the gold medal. Kumara will definitely face tough competition in his hunt for a gold medal from his closest rival Kyvan Sade from Iran who has recorded jumps of 2.26 metres and 2.24 metres as his personal and season’s best. Apart from that, Almaine Mahamat from Qatar will be a tough contender who has recorded a jump of 2.26 metres and 2.26 metres as his personal best and season’s best.
Gayanthika Abeyrathna will also push for a gold medal in the finals of the 800 metres which is scheduled for 6.55 p.m. (7.25 Sri Lanka time) today. Abeyrathna has clocked the best timing out of the six competitors who have lined up for the event. Her closest rival will be Gulshanoi Satarova from Kyrgyzstan.
In men’s weightlifting, Channdana Sangeeth competed in the men’s 62 kg Group B event and finished first with 250 overall points. He scored 109 in the snatch while adding another 141 points in the Clean and Jerk. Kamal Deshapriya competed in the men’s 56 kg group and placed seventh with 240 points (snatch 112, clean and jerk 128).
Chanuka Ushan will compete in the men’s weightlifting 105 kg category on Monday (25).
In men’s taekwondo, Sampath Liyanage will compete in the men’s 68 kg category on Thursday (21) from 9.00 a.m. He will tussle with Serdar Caryyew of Turkmenistan.
The Sri Lankan weightlifting team will begin their competition from next Sunday (24). Divoshan Fernando will be in action in the men’s wrestling freestyle event on Sunday (25). Asha Niroshani Karunasena (48 kg freestyle), M.D. Shamika Madushani (52 kg freestyle) and W.M.D. Dilhani Kumara Weerabahu (58 kg freestyle) will also be in action.
Shamika Madushani is a silver medallist in the 55 kg category of the 2016 South Asian Games in Guwahati and Deepika won a silver medal in the 58 kg category of the 2016 South Asian Games.
The Sri Lankan chess team will begin its competition on Thursday (21).
In the men’s and women’s chess competition, Rajeendra Senaka Kalugampitiya and Romesh Chandra Weerawardena will compete in the Classical, Rapid Men’s team, Blitz Men’s team and Under-23 Rapid Men’s team events.
Mohammed Saumy Zainab and Dasuni Hansika Mendis will represent Sri Lanka in the Classical, Rapid Women’s team, Blitz Women’s team and Under-23 Rapid Women’s team events.
At the end of the afternoon of the third day of competition, host nation Turkmenistan led the medal table with 66 medals (21 golds, 21 silvers and 16 bronzes), with Thailand in second place with 18 medals (4 gold, 5 silver and 9 bronze). The United Arab Emirates is in second place with 12 medals (four golds, three silvers and five bronzes).
