‘Nilani should get chance to run SAG 5000m’ – Hiruni

Sri Lanka Marathoner Hiruni Wijayarathne, who qualified to run the 5,000m and 10,000m at the South Asian Games (SAG) by winning both events at the National Athletics Championship, said she will be opting out of the 5,000m. She also added that if the Sri Lankan officials are smart, they would give that opportunity to Nilani Rathnayaka who broke the national record in the event a few days after the National Championship.

“I’m the South Asian record holder in the marathon. My preference has always been to run the marathon at the SAG, so I think Nilani should get the opportunity to run the 5,000m. If both of us had finished during the Nationals we could have broken the national record. I know she had an unfortunate injury during the nationals. So with my preference to run the 10,000m and the marathon I won’t be running the 5000m, and if Sri Lanka wants to send the next best athlete, that should be Nilani. I know she did not finish second during the nationals, but I think her excellent time and breaking the Sri Lanka record should be sufficient for her to get the chance,” said Hiruni after her training session in Doha.

As we revealed earlier, Nilani was the victim of official miscommunication: where she wasn’t informed by the Athletics Association about her pet event, the 3000m Steeplechase not being included in the South Asian Games events list. She was under the impression that the 3000m Steeplechase was included in the SAG and when she won that with a good time on day one of the competition she thought she will be included in Sri Lanka’s SAG team. During 5000m, Nilani wasn’t at her best due to sickness overnight and gave up the race, confident that she had already made the team.

But a few hours later Nilani was informed about the situation, where the athlete who finished sixth in the Asian Games and fourth in the Asian Championship suddenly felt her world fall apart when she learned she wasn’t included in the SAG team.

The determined athlete returned to the track a week later and ran her heart out in the 5000m clocking 16 minutes 17.82 seconds, which was a new national record, shattering the 16-year old national record in the event and making her case for SAG inclusion.