Shakti poised to show strength with golden hat-trick

All the athletes who participated at Nagercoil and Thiruvananthapuram in the first two legs, will participate here besides Nepal and Bangaladesh who are yet to arrive.

The All India Electricity Sports Control Board is organising the four-leg prize-moneycircuit meet through the respective state units and Karnataka Electricity Board will perhaps conduct their last sports meet under the banner as they are due to be renamed Karnataka Power Transmission Corporation shortly.

The fourth leg will be held in Chennai on July 15. This would be followed by Travancore Open and Federation Cup (in Bangalore). The team will then be picked for the World Championships to be held in Seville (Spain).

Performances are expected to be better here than the one at Thiruvananthapuram where the track was reportedly worn out. Indian thrower Shakti Singh will be looking for a hat-trick of golden double having won the discus and shot put, Sri Lankan Chintaka De Zoysa, the number one sprinter on view, having won at Nagercoil and Thiruvananthapuram in 10.54 seconds.

Some of the big names in India like Paramjit Singh, Jata Shankar, Jincy Phillip and Swaranjit Kaur will be missed as they have left to participate in the World Police Games to be held in Switzerland this week. Alsomissing will be Jyotirmoyee Sikdar while there is still a question mark against P T Usha’s participation.

The Kenyans are expected to dominate the middle and long distances. Gideaon Chirchir, Joseph Mutua and Maina Dedan, who came here after a tour of Europe, had a spectacular 1-2-3 finish in the 5,000m at Thiruvananthapuram. While there is no 5,000m event here, Gulab Chand is expected to put up a stiff fight in the 3,000. Providing spice to the contest would be Iranian Zarekar Ahmed, gold medallist at the fifth Asian cross country meet in Tehran. Lijo David is expected to make up for the absence of Paramjit in the 400m.

Mehdi Jeloodarzadeh Sedehi, a gold medallist in the 1995 Asian junior meet will look forward to bettering his best time of 1:48.58. Iranian coach Jamshed Meharyaar, a national champion for 10 years in 400 metres, is pinning a lot of hope on him. Having done well during an eight-nation meet in Kazakhstan, the 14-member Iranian athletic team go to China after the Chennai leg.

The javelinwill be watched with interest with the introduction of the new javelin. Foreign challenge for Pramod Tiwari is likely to come in the form of Yagoti Dandhatar of Iran. On the distaff side, Ukrainian Kristina Klischerska is the favourite, having touched 55.70m at Thiruvananthapuram. Her nearest challenger will be Gurmeet Kaur. However, Krisitna was confident of bettering her second leg performance. “I hope I will win so that I can make up for the loss of baggage prior to the second leg,” she quipped.

Indian Olympic Association president Suresh Kalmadi will inaugurate the meet. Prize money of Rs 10,000, Rs 5,000 and Rs 2,500 would be given to the first three places.