National Open Athletics Championships: Animesh Kujur breaks Amlan Borgohain’s meet record to clinch gold

Animesh Kujur clinched a gold medal in the men's 200m sprint event by breaking a meet record Amlan Borgohain

Bengaluru: Indian athlete Animesh Kujur clinched a gold medal in the men’s 200m sprint event by breaking a meet record Amlan Borgohain at the National Open Athletics Championships 2023 in Bengaluru on Saturday.

The 20-year-old Animesh Kujur clocked a new personal best of 20.74s to top the podium ahead of Akshay Nain (20.97) and Shashikanth Angadi (21.14), as per Olympics.com.

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Animesh Kujur set a new meet record with his race at the Sree Kanteerava Outdoor Stadium, surpassing Amlan Borgohain’s prior mark of 20.75 in 2021. The men’s 200-meter national record in India belongs to Amlan Borgohain, who ran a personal best of 20.52.

Meanwhile, in the women’s javelin throw event, Annu Rani, who recently won a gold medal at the Asian Games 2023 in Hangzhou, didn’t start despite featuring in the start list.

In Annu Rani’s absence, Jyoti (53.59m) took the gold while Karishma Sanil (52.86m) and Priyanka (52.57m) bagged the silver and bronze medals, respectively.

The big upset of the day came in the women’s 800m, with Maharashtra’s Yamuna Ladkat clocking a personal best of 2:01.95 to beat Asian Championships 2023 silver medallist KM Chanda (2:02.66) to the finish line.

The men’s 400m hurdles race turned out to be a highly competitive affair with the top five clocking at sub-51 seconds. Nikhil Bhardwaj, with a personal best of 50.45, clinched the top podium.