The Indian mixed 4x400 relay team set an Asian junior record en route qualifying for the final at the World U-20 Athletics Championships in Colombia. The Indian quartet of Barath Sridhar, Priya Mohan, Kapil and Rupal Chaudhary clocked 3 minutes and 19.62 seconds to win heat number 3 on Monday. India finished second overall across the three heats behind the USA, who won heat number 2 with a championships record time of 3:18.65s. The final will be held at 03:20am IST on Wednesday.
India had won a bronze in the mixed 4x400m relay in the last edition in Nairobi, Kenya in 2021, where the event was introduced for the first time.
Rupal is the only new member of the quartet that had won bronze last year while Sridhar, Priya and Kapil were there in that team.
15-year-old Ashakiran Barla made it to the women 800m semifinals as one of the four fastest runners outside the four automatic qualifiers each from the five heats. She clocked 2:09.01s to finish sixth in heat number 1.
Sanyam Sanjay finished 13th overall in shotput qualification round with a best effort of 18.36m and missed the final by just 0.01m.
The other Indian shot putter, Sawan finished 15th with a best effort of 18.31m.
Aman Khokhar could not make it to the 100m dash semifinals after finishing seventh in heat number 8 and 48th overall with a timing of 10.84 seconds.
Arjun Waskale failed to advance further in men's 1500m race after finishing seventh in heat number one and 26th overall with a timing of 3:51.10s.
Meanwhile, in the latest list of sanctioned athletes issued by Athletics Integrity Unit of the world governing body, India's triple jumper Donald Makimairaj, who had finished fourth in the World U-20 Championships last year, has been banned for four years after testing positive for a banned drug.
His ineligibility period will be upto August 24, 2025 and his results after August 2, 2021 will be annulled.