India's campaign in the showpiece athletics event of the Asian Games began on a lacklustre note with Hardeep Kaur finishing sixth in the women's hammer throw at the Khalifa Stadium in Doha on Friday.

Hardeep hurled the hammer to a distance of 56.41 mt to hardly pose any threat to her opponents on a day when some of the athletes qualified to the final of their respective events.

China's Wenxiu Zhang clinched the gold medal in hammer throw with a Asian Games record throw of 74.14 , improving upon his previous record of 73.24 m established in Changsha (China) in 2005. Compatriot Yuan Gu (63.13) took the silver while the bronze went to Japan's [Images] Masumi Aya (62.67).

India's star heptathlete Soma Biswas was in the third position after the completion of four events in women's heptathlon with a total of 3291, 298 points behind the leader Kazakhstan's Olga Rypakova. Kazakhstan's Irina Naumenko was in the second psotion with 3331 points.

Another Indian heptathlete J J Shobha was in the sixth position with a total of 3201 after the first day of competitions.

Preeja Sridharan produced a personal best timing of 33:48.45 as she finished fifth in the women's 10,000 m run held amidst gusty winds and chilly conditions.

Preeja, who had won the gold medal in the SAF Games in Colombo this year in the 5000 event, began with a flourish but could not sustain the tempo right through the race which was won by Japan's Kayako Fukushi with a timing of 31;29.38.

Shanti Soundarajan and Sinimole Paulose had no diffulty in cruising into the final of the women's 800 m. While Santhi finished first in her heat with a timing of 2:08.62 Paulose, a SAF Games silver medallist, clocked 2:10.16 to take the second position in her heat.

In the men's long jump, India's Shiv Shankar Yadav just about managed to qualify to the final with a first jump effort of 7.51 m.

Although the qualifying mark was set at 7.60, he managed to sneak in as a second best performer as only three jumpers achieved the qualifying mark.

Hamza Chatoli recorded a personal best timing of 3:44.35 as he forced his way into the final of the men's 1500 m run heats.