AASL sets up special trial for World Championship qualification
Athletics Association (AASL) has decided to conduct a special trial for selected events to give athletes who are close to the IAAF World Championship qualification standard another chance to achieve the required standard or improve their world ranking position to within the first 32 of the event in order to be selected for the World Athletics showpiece.
The World Championship will be held from 27 September 27 to 6 October and only Marathoner Hiruni Wijayarathne has achieved the required standard so far.
Accordingly three events – Long Jump (Men), Javelin Throw (Men) and 3000m Steeple Chase (Women) – were selected, as the National champions of each of these events are close to the required standard, with Long Jumpers and Javelin Throwers even having performed better than the qualification standard in previous years.
3000m steeple chase National Champion Nilani Rathnayake has withdrawn from the event citing health issues, and only the Long Jump and Javelin Throw trials will held on 4 September (Wednesday) on the final day of the Junior National Athletics Championship. The Javelin Throw event will be held at 10.30 a.m. while the Long Jump event will be held at 3.00 p.m.
The qualification standards have been revised for certain events, making it more difficult for athletes to qualify. For example, High Jump (Men’s) entry standard is 2.30m, whereas the last edition’s Bronze medalist’s performance was only 2.29m.
Direct qualification standard for Long Jump (Men) is 8.17m. Present National Champion Amila Jayasiri has a personal best of 8.15m.
At present Amila Jayasiri is ranked 47th and Prasad Wimalasiri, who represented Sri Lanka at the Commonwealth Games, Asian Games and Asian Championship, is ranked 45th. A leap of 8.12m will take them into the elite list of 32, which includes several US and Chinese athletes.
With limitation of only three athletes per country per event, they could go further up the list where a leap of roughly more than 8.10m could see a Sri Lankan Long Jumper competing in the World Championship.
Both Prasad Wimalasiri and Greshan Dhananjaya will not be competing at the trials, as Greshan is suffering from an injury and Wimalasiri is not at his best.
Direct qualification standard for the Javelin Throw (Men) is 83.0m, but current National Champion Sumedha Ranasinghe has a personal best of 83.03m, and cleared the 80m mark at the Nationals too. Apart from Ranasinghe, Waruna Lakshan Dayarathne (82.19m) and Sampath Ranasinghe (81.12m) too have cleared the 80m mark during the last two years.
The other qualification method is to be within the 32 in the IAAF top performance list by the cut-off date of 6 September 2019.
In the Javelin Throw, Sumedha Ranasinghe is presently ranked 58th, and a throw of 82.8 – 83m could take him inside the first 32 in the list. There are several German throwers in the list and when the limitation of three athletes per country is applied, he ranking will go up, and another good performance by the cutoff date would see both a Javelin Thrower and a Long Jumper competing in the World Championship.
In 2017, Javelin Thrower Waruna Lakshan made the World Championship cut with his performance of 82.19m. He was in the first 32 in the world by the cut-off date in 2017.
