Odisha sprint stars Dutee Chand and Amiya Kumar Mallick failed to live upto their reputation on the second day of the 60th National Inter State Senior Athletics Championship at Netaji Subhas National Institute of Sports, Patiala today. Both the sprinters also failed to crack the qualifying mark for the ensuing Tokyo Olympic Games.

National record holder Dutee finished fourth in the women 100 metre final, clocking 11.62 seconds. Tamil Nadu duo of Dhana Lakshmi (11.52s) and Archana S Suseendran (11.60s) bagged gold and bronze respectively, while silver went to Sri Lankan Amasha de Silva (11.59s).

Making the matter worse, Dutte suffered a muscle injury in the final and was seen limping on the track after finishing the race. This was the second time in the onging championship that she suffered the injury. Earlier during the heats, Dutee strained her left quadriceps muscles. Though she finished the final with a better timing than her heats, where she had clocked 11.76, yet finishing fourth came as huge disappointment.

It may be recalled that Dutee had rewrote her 100m National record at the Indian Grand Prix 4 in Patiala with a time of 11.17 seconds, which was 0.02 seconds short of Olympics qualifying mark of 11.15 five days ago. Now, she can get the Tokyo ticket only on the basis of her world rankings.

Meanwhile, Amiya Mallick, also the National record holder, salvaged some pride for Odisha, winning bronze medal in mens 100m final with a time of 10.49 seconds. Punjab duo Gurindervir Singh (10.27s) and Love Preet Singh (10.47s) secured gold and silver respectively, ahead of Amiya.

Gurindervir also created a new meet record and missed the opportunity to equal the National record of Amiya by a mere 0.01 second. However, none of the three medalists could come close to the Olympic qualifying mark of 10.05 seconds.

As many as four athletes represented Odisha in the National Inter-State Senior Championship. Of the other two Odisha athletes, Divya Sandhyal finished in 9th in women shot put. Jauna Murmu, the fourth Odisha athlete is scheduled to compete in womens 400 metre run tomorrow.
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PHOTO: Mens 100m medal winners (L to R) Love Preet Singh, Gurindervir Singh and Amiya Mallick with Athletics Federation of India president Adille Sumariwalla in Patiala on 26 June, 2021.