After Asian heroics , Aruna now eyes world title
After record breaking performance in Japan , Aruna Darshana will start his bid to win the World Junior title on Wednesday (11th) at Finland ,where he will compete in the 400m heat of the IAAF World Junior championship at 1.50pm SL time.
The golden boy hailing from Kanthale who reminisces early days of Sugath Thilakaratne when he shattered the Asian Junior record to win the 400m Gold in Japan with a 45.79 seconds timing, the best by any Sri Lankan since 2006.
His time was ranked 4th on paper: There are four entries with better timings than him on paper but with the competition rule limiting to just two athletes per country, one Jamaican athlete out of the top three will have to sit out leaving two Jamaicans and one US athlete ahead of Aruna. But, the time of 45.79 which is considered in comparison, wasn’t Aruna’s best.
He was very much relaxed when he clocked that time and won the Asian Juniors and was visible that he had much energy left in the tank. Also, the silver at the last World Junior Championship was won in a time of 46.21 seconds which lit up further hopes about a medal for Aruna at the World Juniors.
Athlete hailing from Weerakeppetipola NS ,Akuramboda in the Matale District took part in his final training session yesterday at Finland along with his coach Asanka Rajakaruna getting ready to make the history by winning Sri Lanka’s first ever world junior medal .
