Luka brightest on Day 1

Clouds including those of doubt hung over the recently-inaugurated-but-far-from-complete Jawaharlal Nehru Stadium as it geared up to stage its first test event,the two-day Asian All Star athletic meet on Thursday....

Clouds including those of doubt hung over the recently-inaugurated-but-far-from-complete Jawaharlal Nehru Stadium as it geared up to stage its first test event,the two-day Asian All Star athletic meet on Thursday.

After threatening for a while,the heavens opened up and surely enough,there were puddles of water and mud,a delayed and largely lacklustre opening ceremony,self-congratulatory keynote speeches,school children filling in for spectators and yawns. But in between all that,there was a glimpse of some engrossing action in the middle.

To be certain,the standard of the competition belied the nomenclature All Star,as it was anything but a congregation of the continents athletics elite in a few events on Day One,mens discus throw for example,all eight participants were Indians. No wonder then that the hosts were topping the medal tally with six gold medals, five silver and six bronze at the end of the day.

An odd athlete,however,made the most of the available opportunity and left an impression. There was a lot of buzz surrounding Tintu Luka,a prodigious 800m athlete and a protege of PT Usha. With the former track queen watching from the stands,the 20-year-old destroyed the modest field,setting up a personal best of 2:01.24 to win gold by a considerable margin.

She could have run sub two minutes if there was somebody to push her in the second lap, said Usha,while praising her ward. It was a good performance and might have been even better had she not slowed down towards the start of the second lap.

Tintu will participate in an international meet in Britain before heading to Brussels for a Diamond League meet on August 27.

At the moment she is looking for international exposure. 800m is a tactical race,Im sure she will improve by the time the Commonwealth Games come, Usha added.

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One of big names on Day One was the hugely built Vikas Gowda,but the discus thrower disappointed,even as he comfortable took the gold medal in an all India field. After four fouls throws,he hurled the discus to 54.39m,over 10 metres short of his personal best.

The US-based athlete blamed his below par performance on the conditions. After the rain,it became quite slippery out there,hence this performance. I am not sure how it will be during October. I hope to do better next time, he said.

Among others,Mandeep Kaur clocked her seasons best of 52.29s to win womens 400m gold after the race started late due to pistol malfunctioning. Kazakhstans Julia Gavrilova 52.93s won silver while Indias Juana Murmu 53.17s took bronze.

Up and coming long jumper Ankit Sharma,who reached the final of the World Junior Championships in Canada last week,added another gold for India with a jump of 7.61m. It was one-two-three for India with Maha Singh and Harikrishnan bagging silver and bronze respectively with identical jumps of 7.50m.