Amasha,Aruna,Dilshi,Dasun and relay team win Gold medals
Sri Lanka sealed five gold medals including a clean sweep in the men’s 400m at the 3rd South Asian Junior Athletics Championship started at Sugathadasa stadium .
Coming off a chaotic night SL sprinters dazzled with four medals which also includes four new meet records and two Sri Lanka junior records while high jumper Tharindu Dasun clinched gold in his field events.
All eyes were on team captain Aruna Darshana from Akuramboda CC who bettered his personal best, Sri Lanka junior record and set new meet record of 46.55 seconds to win the gold medal while his fellow Sri Lankan Pasindu Kodikara ( 46.99sec) finished second for the silver with Pabasara Niku (47.43 sec) finishing third to make a clean sweep. The trio later received their medals from a 400m national champion and Asian Games gold medalist Sugath Thilakarathne.
Before that, Dilshi Kumarasinghe from A. Rathnayake CC Walala clinched an easy gold medal setting another new meet record with a 54.47 seconds run in the women’s 400m. Dilshi whose pet event is 800m will be eyeing to clinch the double today winning the event.
Dasun was the first to deliver a medal for Sri Lanka jumping 2.04 m against the heavy wind in his run up. Dasun hailing from Mahinda College Galle is training under high jump National Champion Manjula Kumara Wijesekara was eyeing 2.14m to qualify for the Asian Junior Championship but failed to make it due to jumping against the wind.
Kandy sprinter Amasha de Silva dazzled with two gold medals on the day as she delivered the first gold medal in track events for Sri Lanka clocking a championship record and a new personal best of 11.92 seconds in the 100m final. de Silva hailing from Swarnamali Girls college Kandy also anchored SL 4x100m women’s relay team to a gold as 17 year old Shelinda Jansen from Gateway College ran a perfect bend in the starting lap closing the gap with the Indian team and changed the baton to fellow Gateway sprinter Sharmila Jan who held on to Indian runner and did a safe baton change with Safiya Yamic from Viharamahadevi GC Kandy who then changed to her fellow Kandyan training mate Amasha who gave no chance to India. They set a new meet record and a new Sri Lanka junior record.
17 year old Shelinda also won the 100m bronze medal with a personal best of 12.28 seconds. Amasha will now eye to increase her gold count with wins in the 200m and 4x400m today.
Heartbreak
Sri Lanka had a few heart breaking incidents at the meet where the men’s 4x100m relay team dropped the baton while gold medal prospect Ridma Nishadi failed to win it. Sri Lanka were leading the relay until the second lap runner changed the baton with the third lap runner Chamod Yodasinghe who could not hold on to the baton properly and he dropped the baton breaking hearts of the team members as well as many who was cheering from outside.
In the women’s long jump being the only jumper who had leapt over the 6.00m mark Ridma Nishadi was the favorite to win the gold medal but could only leap 5.91m as she was beaten by India’s Punitha Ramasamy (5.95m). Several eye brows were also seen raised towards Ridma’s coach, Chandimal Niroshan who was more focused on safeguarding controversial manager Anil Weerasinghe misleading athletes to sign false letters rather than focusing on Ridma’s training.
More:-http://www.ceylonathletics.com/events/sajac2018
