Saraswati Saha betters Usha's 200m record

Saraswati Saha continued her superb running in the women's 200 metres, recording a sub-23 seconds time for the second time in less than ten days, at the 42nd National Open athletics championships in Delhi on Sunday.

In the process, she also erased P T Usha's meet record of 23.2 seconds, set in 1986.

The Railways' athlete, who clocked 22.82 seconds to shatter Rachita Mistry's national record of 23.10 seconds in Ludhiana in the last circuit meet on August 29, today stopped the clock in 22.83 seconds to set the new meet record.

Saraswati's brilliance together with Anuradha Biswal's national record-equalling effort in women's 100 metres hurdles, and meet records by Manisha Dey and Anand Menezes, in women's triple jump and men's 200 metres respectively, lit up the proceedings.

Reacting to the gun in quick time in lane four, Saraswati moved into the lead straightaway and, coming out around the bend, pulled away from the rest. LIC's Vinita Tripathy, in lane six, couldn't catch up with her in the home stretch as Saraswati finished with a comfortable lead.

Tripathy took the second spot, recording 23.37 seconds while Rajwinder Kaur of Police held off a stiff challenge from Mukti Saha of Railways to win the bronze medal. Rajwinder returned a time of 24.74 seconds.

Aunradha Biswal's win in the 100 metres hurdles was another commanding performance, leaving the rest of the field to fight for the silver and bronze medals.

Her timing of 13.38 seconds equalled her own effort on the same track in the circuit meet. Till then the national record in her name was the 13.40 seconds she clocked in the Jakarta ATF in 2000.

Anand Menezes was also impresive, winning the men's 200 metres in a new meet record time of 21.06 seconds.

Like Saraswati, Menezes too was well clear of the rest as he crossed the line ahead of Ganesh Satpute of Maharastra, who finished second in 21.75 seconds and S Srinivas of Andhra Pradesh, who came third clocking 21.77 seconds.

The Railways athlete was well ahead coming in the last 100 metres and led by some distance as he touched the tape in record time. The earlier meet record was in the name of Anil Kumar, who had clocked 21.13 seconds in Bhopal in 1999.

In the women's triple jump, Railways' Manisha Dey leaped to a distance of 13.35 metres to erase Lekha Thomas's name from the meet record list.

Manisha's first jump measured 12.95 metres, better than the second place winning distance of 12.93 metres by Shilpa Sequeira of LIC. Manisha then touched 13.10 metres in her second attempt before attaining her best in the fifth attempt.

M Krishna Priya's effort of 12.63 metres gave the Tamil Nadu girl the third place.

In the men's 110 metres hurdles, Railways' P T Yesudas clocked 14.61 seconds to take the gold. Karnataka's Harish Kushalappa won the silver in 14.66 seconds and Kuldeep Singh the bronze in 14.89 seconds.

The men's discus throwers disappointed with an average performance. Uttar Pradesh's Hridayanand Singh won the gold with a throw of 54.63 metres. Police's Krishna Kumar Sharma was second with an effort of 51.43 metres, while Davinder Kumar of Punjab came third with a throw of 49.91 metres.