Odisha sprint star and current National record holder Dutee Chand suffered a major setback when she was beaten by S Dhanalakshmi of Tamil Nadu in the women 100 metre final on the second day of the 24th National Federation Cup Senior Athletics Championships at Netaji Subhas National Institute of Sports (NSNIS) in Patiala today.

Dhana Lakshmi captured the gold medal with a time of 11.39 seconds, while Dutee settled for silver medal, clocking 11.58 seconds. Assam star Hima Das, who competed in this event, was disqualified due to false start. This was a big upset considering the fact that Dutee had been virtually ubeatable over this distance in India.

The last time Dutee did not win a race featuring only Indians was back in the Inter-Railway Championship in Bhopal in August 2015, a month after she ended up with bronze in the National Inter-State Athletics Championships in Chennai. However, none of the medalists could achieve the qualification mark 11.15 seconds for the Tokyo Olympic Games 2021.

Odisha suffered another misfortune in the day as star male sprinter Amiya Kumar Mallick finished seventh in 100 meter final, clocking 10.75 seconds. The gold in the event was pocketed by Gurinder Singh of Punjab with a time of 10.32 seconds. Olympic Qualification mark in this event is 10.05 seconds.

Kerala long-jumper M Sreeshankar stole the thunder in the day, booking his place in the Olympic Games competition with a National Record leap of 8.26 metre. On his way to gold, the World No 24 improved on his own National mark of 8.20m, set in Bhubaneshwar on September 27, 2018.
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PHOTO: Undated file picture of Tamil Nadu sprinter S Dhanalakshmi.