Santhush qualifies for World Youth

Sprinter from St. Benedict’s College Kotahena Santhush Weerasinghe clocked his personal best time of 21.96 seconds in the 200m and qualified for the finals of the IAAF World Youth Championship after he finished third in the semi-final at the Asian Youth Athletics Championship continued at Bangkok, Thailand monday.

Santhush who is still 16 years old, clocked 22.00 seconds in the heats where he achieved the World youth qualification standards of 22.05 seconds and further lowered her personal best in the semi-finals running his first sub 22 seconds performance.

Youngster who trains under Amila Prasanna, will be competing in the finals today in lane 02. Nevertheless, the winner of that semi-final Sittiphon Donpritee of Thailand set a new meet record of 21.59 seconds running on home soil, but his joy was short-lived as the winner of the next semi-final, Minkyu Shin from Korea clocked 21.45 seconds to renew the record.

In the girls’ 200m, Lyceum sprinter Sachini Divyanjali, also trains under Prasanna, clocked her personal best time of 25.35 seconds and was placed third in the 200m heat where she too qualified for the 200m finals to be held today.