Anju Bobby George became the second Indian after discus thrower Neelam Jaswant Singh to enter the finals in the World Athletics Championships when she leaped to 6.59 metres in the long jump qualifiers in Paris, according to reports reaching here today. The Busan Asian Games gold medallist finished third in her group behind Eunice Barber of France (6.70m) and Russian Lyudmila Galkina (6.72). The other qualifiers from Anju’s group are: Fiona May (6.57), Valentina Gotovska (6.56), Tatyana Kotova (6.56) and Grace Upshaw (6.55) and the finals are slated for Saturday.Anju achieved the feat in her first jump but failed to improve upon it in her next two attmpts with foul jumps. The qualifying effort in Paris was, however, 0.6 metres less than her season’s best of 6.65m which she achieved in a IAAF Super Grand Prix meet before the Paris event. But Anju’s personal best has been 6.74 metres, which is also the national record.The Indian, who is training under legendary Mike Powell in ther US, was not overawed by the occassion as the field in her group consisted of top contenders like Russian Tatyana Kotova, triple jump world record holder Inessa Kravets of Ukraine, Eunice Barber of France and Fiona May of Italy all with a personal best above the seven metre mark.Kotava leads the field of 27 with a season’s best of 6.94m and a personal best of 7.42m. There are 13 contestants in group A while the other group has 14 athletes.
