Odisha ace Dutee Chand justified her reputation as the fastest woman of the country by winning the 100 metre gold medal with both Meet and National Records in the 58th National Inter-State Senior Athletics Championship, which concluded at Sarusajai Stadium in Guwahati today. She also qualified for the Jakartak Asian Games in this event.
Dutee first broke the National Record, clocking 11.29 seconds in the semifinals, erasing the previous record of 11.30 seconds, which had also been set by her last year at New Delhi. The Odisha sprinter followed her sterling performance with a Meet Record of the 11.32 seconds in the final, which fetched her the gold.
In the process, Dutee eclipsed the previous Meet Mark of 11.39 seconds, achieved by Shradha Narayanan at Lucknow in 2014. This was the second medal for Dutee, who had won siver in 200 metre sprint earlier on the second day of the four-day meet. However, Srabani Nanda, the other star sprinter of Odisha, could not compete in the 100 metre final due to injury.