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EXPRESS NEWS SERVICE
CALCUTTA, Nov 17: Usha, who had complained that her relatively poor performance in women's 100m was due to the sudden change in schedule, today fell on the track about 20m away from the finish-line in 200m. She had a lead of about 10m at that stage and was running really well. ``I felt a catch in my right hamstrings at the second bend,'' Usha explained. ``Even then, I kept on running. A little later the problem increased and I had to stop to avoid further injury.''
Usha suddenly staggered in front of the VIP podium before collapsing on her lane. However, she was able walk out of the stadium without any visible limp, bellying fears of a serious injury. Doctors who attended on her immediately after the mishap, confirmed that it was minor thing and India's golden girl in athletics should recover in a few days.
The Usha incident notwithstanding, the day belonged to Bengal, who aggregated 121 points to take the trophy. They were followed by Kerala with 117 points. Bengal also took the women's championship with107 points while Punjab became the men's champions with 72 points.
The last day of the meet saw three new meet records being created in 4x400m men's relay, women's 10km walk and women's high jump. Bobby Alosyous of Tamil Nadu equalled her Open nationals performance of 1.81m in the women's high jump for a new meet record. The earlier one of 1.80m also stood in her name.
The AAFI men's relay team of Lijjo David Thottan, P Ramachandran, Dinesh Rawat and Jata Shankar almost ran alone to create a new meet mark of 3:06.02s. The same team without Rawat and with Paramjit Singh running the anchoring had created a national record in the Open Nationals.
The third record of the day was set by Paramjit Kaur of Punjab in women's 10km walk. Paramjit clocked 52:39.0s as against the earlier mark of 53:54.5 by Asha Sebestian in 1995.
The 1500m for women was perhaps the most interesting race of the day besides the women's 200m, with Sunit Rani leading Jyotirmoyee Sikdar for the initial 1200 metres. Rani in fact, setthe pace with Sikdar following very close. With about 300 metres remaining, the Bengal girl produced her burst and ran away an easy winner with a timing of 4:13.60s, well within the AAFI target of 4:15.00s. Rani took the silver with 4:16.81s.
National record holder in men's javelin Satbir Singh, who was involved in a small accident just before his event in the Open Nationals, is yet to recover and skipped the event at the Inter-state meet too.
Results (all finals)
Men's 200m: 1 Kishan (Kar) 21.79s; 2 Ajay Raj Singh (Pun) 22.00; 3 Jyoti Prakash (Ker) 22.38. 800m: 1 Jayan Kurian (Ker) 1:53.08 min; 2 Nagesh Shetty (Mah) 1:53.66; 3 Ajit Nayak (Mah) 1:53.85. 5000m: 1 Satish Kumar (Har) 14:48.37 min; 2 Anil Kumar (Bih) 14:54.35; 3 Shivanand (Kar) 15:19.98. 110m hurdles: 1 Sahib Singh (Pun) 14.19s; 2 Ranjit Randhawa (Del) 14.50; 3 Jangjit Singh (Pun) 14.67. 4x400m: 1 AAFI 3:06.02 min; 2 Kerala 3:18.18; Tamil Nadu 3:18.82. Triple jump: 1 Robert Bobby Jorge (Bih) 15.50m; 2 Diego Braganza (Guj) 15.43; 3 IRajesh (TN) 15.33. Javelin: 1. Ramandeep Singh (Pun) 75.14m; 2 Jagdish Vishnoi (Pun) 74.96; 3 Brahma Dube (Mah) 70.32. Decathlon: 1 Gamdhor Singh (Pun) 6207 pts; 2 Pradeep Alok (Guj) 6147; 3 Phullel Singh (Pun) 6099.
Women's 200m:1 G Vasanthi (Del) 24.67s; 2 Poonam Belliappa (Kar) 25.10; 3 R Sukumari (Ker) 25.22. 1500m:
1 Jyotirmoyee Sikdar (WB) 4:13.60 min; 2 Sunita Rani (Pun) 4:16.81; 3 Madhuri Gurnule (Mah) 4:41.25. 4x400m: 1 West Bengal 3:46.02 min; 2 Kerala 3:50.21; 3 Tamil Nadu 3:58.05. High jump: 1 Bobby Alosyous (TN) 1.81m; 2 Jayanti (TN) 1.73; 3 Lucy Deshmukh (WB) 1.60. 10km walk:1 Paramjit Kaur (Pun) 52:39.0 min; 2 Rajdeep Kaur (Pun) 57:19.9; 3 Rupa Bhowmick (WB) 57:47.1.
Copyright © 1998 Indian Express Newspapers (Bombay) Ltd.
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