The morning session today witnessed some noteworthy performances in the 5000m race with Abhishek Pal (Assam), Jatinder Kumar (Punjab) and Sharwan fighting it out in a keen battle in the junior men's category.
Abhishek, the bronze medalist in last year's Asian Youth Games at Nanjing in 3000m, led the race initially. However the 17-year-old runner received stiff challenge in the second half of the race from Jatinder and Sharwan.
At the waning stages of the race, Sharwan, a junior camper who made a last minute entry here, was in a commanding position and went on to win the race in a thrilling finish with a time of 14 minutes 54.51 secs -- a time that take him on the Indian Team to this year's Asian Junior Championships at Chinese Taipei next month.
In women's 5000m race, Maharashtra's Sanjivani Jadhav, a double gold-medalist in the inaugural Asian School Track and Field Championship at Kuantan (Malaysia) last year, was a pre-race favourite.
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The 17-year-old lived-up her billing by clocking 17:11.27 for the title. In that process she also erased the previous meet mark (17:30.48) that stood in the name of Sahanara Khaturn of West Bengal in a big margin.
Another Maharashtrian, Janabhai Hirve finished third in 18:07.58 while the silver medal in this event went to Madhya Pradesh's Neha (17:46.43).
Sanjivani, in spite of winning the gold, was unhappy about her performance as she could not make the Asian junior qualification standard of 16:32.02 whereas the World junior grade stands at 16:40.