Indian Grand Prix: Kamalpreet Kaur breaches 60m twice on return to competition

CHANDIGARH: Olympian discus thrower Kamalpreet Kaur breached the 60m mark twice to kick off her season with a gold medal at the Indian Grand Prix 2 in Thiruvananthapuram on Wednesday. The 26-year-old took the yellow metal with an effort of 61.39m on her sixth and final attempt.
Kamalpreet’s throw of 60.15m in her third attempt was enough to clinch the top spot at the podium even as the silver and bronze medallists Nidhi Rani (50.96m) and Sunita (47.36m) of nearby Haryana, were nowhere near the national record holder from Punjab.
“This competition was a good warm up for me, especially after returning from the offseason. The best part was there was no pressure nor was there a competition target. I went out to test myself with a bit of training and I’m happy to get a feel of the competition mode,” she told TOI after the meet.
Kamalpreet, who had finished sixth in the Tokyo Games with a best throw of 63.70m, is featuring in her first competition post the Olympic high. And with a couple of throws going past the 60m mark, it will boost her confidence going ahead into the busy season in which the World Championships, Commonwealth Games and Asian Games dot the calendar.
“Certainly, it’s going to be a busy year ahead, and accordingly the training modules will intensify. With three major international tournaments coming up this year, the IGPs and the other domestic competitions are a great platform to gradually get back to my best throwing form,” she added.
Meanwhile, Avinash Sable set a men’s 3000m Steeplechase national record at the Chandrasekharan Nair Police Stadium. Competing for the first time since the Tokyo Games, a languid Avinash (Maharashhra) stayed on the heels of Balkishan (Haryana) who set a good pace from the start. The Olympian shifted gears with three laps to go and came home in 8:16.21, shaving off 1.91 seconds from his own record set in Tokyo.
Trailing Kerala team-mate Abdulla Aboobacker until the midway stage of the men’s Triple Jump competition Eldhose Paul came up with a personal best effort of 16.95m to claim gold. In fact, each of his last three efforts – 16.74, 16.95 and 16.76 – was good enough to get him the title ahead of Abdulla Aboobacker’s best of 16.70.
There seems to be no stopping Priya H Mohan's rise as the best women’s 400m sprinter. She beat the vastly experienced MR Poovamma to second place yet again. Jisna Mathew strained her every sinew to claim the bronze medal. In the process, Priya clocked a personal best time of 52.37 seconds, a 0.21-second improvement over her previous best secured in the Inter-University Championships in Bhubaneshwar last month.