2 hours Ago By Sahan Weerasooriya
With their record breaking throws delivered in March, Sumeda Ranasinghe and Rumesh Tharanga will be the selectors’ easiest picks in the Sri Lanka team for the upcoming Asian Athletics Championships. The bienniale championship will be held from May 27 to 31 in Gumi, South Korea. Unlike at the previous editions Sri Lanka’s javelin throwers are in uncharted territory.
The massive early season throws have placed the two Sri Lankan throwers in the second and thrid places in the world’s top list this year behind USA’s Curtis Thompson. In the fourth position in that list is India’s Olympic medallist Niraj Chopra who has a throw of 84.52 as his best effort this year.
Olympian Ranasinghe regained the national record with a throw of 85.78 metres at the trial held on March 9 at Diyagama. That was within a fortnight after Tharanga threw a world leading distance of 85.
41 metres in Perth, Australia. Sri Lanka Athletics is yet to announce the team for the Asian Championship. But the two throwers are almost certain to get the nod as they are in a historic top spot which is difficult to ignore.
In the women’s category too, javelin thrower Dilhani Lekamge is a top contender to book a ticket to Gumi as her best distance of 56.26 metres this year rank within the top 29 in Asia. The men’s 400 metres had been the country’s most productive medal winning event at the Asian Athletics Championships.
Currently, sprinter Aruna Dharshana and Kalinga Kumarage are ranked in the fourth and fifth positions in Asia. Both are yet to clock sub 46 seconds in the one lap discipline. Qatar’s Abderrahman Samba and Ammar Ismail Yahia Ibrahim and Japan’s Fuga Sato who won the silver at the last edition are the only Asians to have run the distance under 46 seconds this year.
Dispite not faring well at the recent Asian Indoors, Sri Lanka will field a 4×400 metres relay team to defend the gold in May. Dharshana and Kalinga are likely to be joined by two junior athletes as two of the gold winning members have produced below par performaces this year. Sri Lanka Athletics has received a quota for 18 members after country’s outstanding performaces at the last edition in Bangkok.
Sri Lanka won eight medals, three golds, two silvers and three bronzes. They were ranked fourth behind Japan, China and India according to the medal tally by Reemus Fernando.
