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AGP 2007: Men’s event-wise preview (by Ram.
Murali Krishnan)
The men’s line-up in this year’s Asian Grand Prix is widely
open. No doubt that it does have a number of medalists from last
year’s Asian Games at Doha, and previous continental and global
competitions. However, as the margin of performance look ‘thin’
between the favourites and little-knowns, an emergence of new
champions from this year’s series will not be ruled out.
100m:
Wachara Sondee (PB: 10.38) and Sittichai Suwonprateep (10.36)
will give other competitors a run for their money! The Thai
speed-masters were part of their Gold winning relay quartet at
Doha Asiad last year, where Sondee also took a bronze in the
100m. With the first leg being organized at their home-ground,
Alaguvel Aravind (India, 10.41), Mohd Latif Nyat (Malaysia,
10.45) and Vyacheslav Muravyov (Kazakhstan, 10.46) will have to
work hard with the Thai duo for a podium finish.
400m:
Sri Lankans are quite strong in this event. Prasanna Amarasekara
had a good track record in the past AGP series. The silver
medalist in last year’s South Asian Games had the advantage from
the absence of his compatriot Rohan Pradeep Kumara. Prasanna,
credited with a personal best of 45.47, however expecting
competition from Wang Liangyu of China (46.13) and silver
medalist from last year’s Asian junior championships—Reza
Bouazar of Iran. Reza with a season’s best 46.37s could pull a
surprise. Also in the fray are 2002 Asian Games champ Fawzi Al-Shammeri
and Thailand’s Asian Indoor silver medalist Jukkatip Pojaroen.
1,500m:
Indian middle distance runners Chatholi Hamza (3:41.12) and
Sajeesh Joseph (3:43.13) are favourites in this event. Hamza won
the South Asian gold at Colombo while Sajeesh claimed a bronze
in the asian juniors at Macau last year. Iran’s Sajad Moradi,
the 800m bronze medalist in 2005 asian championships at Incheon,
is another athlete to watch here. This event being introduced in
the AGP series for the first time.
3,000m:
Indians are formidable in this event also. Sunil Kumar (PB:
8:12.58), 5th in 5,000m at the 2006 Asian Games together with
Surendra Singh, the 2007 Asian cross-country silver medallist at
Amman will form the challenge. The other athletes in the fray
are Chaminda Indika Wijekoon (Sri Lanka, 8:09.58) and Ajmar
Amirov (Tadjikistan, 8:16.43).
400m Hurdles:
Two times world championship bronze medalist, Tamesue Dai of
Japan seeded at the top with career best 47.89 and a season
leading 48.73 secs. Meng Yan, the silver medalist at Doha had a
clean sweep of titles in the last series with a pb of 49.03
recorded at Bangalore. Meng’s team-mate Zhu Zhi (49.88) and
former World University Games silver medalist Yevgeniy
Meleshenko (Kazakhstan, 49.46) are promised to make the
competition a memorable one. India already had a blow in the
withdrawal of Patlavath Shankar.
High Jump:
Korean jumper Kim Young-Min (pb-2.24), Kazakhstan’s Sergey
Zasimovich (2.23), Sri lankan Manjula Wijesekara (2.23) and
India’s Harishankar Roy (2.25) are expected to do the
unexpected! Roy with back-to-back victories in 2006, had also
credited with a season leading 2.21 to start with this year. The
other Indian jumper, Benedict Starly, had to skip the event
following an injury.
Triple Jump:
This event will witness one of the best line-ups in recent
years. China’s Li Yanxi (17.15), gold medalist in Doha Asiad,
together with silver medalist Roman Valiyev (16.98) of
Kazakhstan will clash with Renjith Maheswary of India. Renjith,
4th at Doha, surprised everyone back home at Kolkata with a
16.72m jump in the Indian Federation Cup. The second Chinese
athlete on the start-list, former Asian indoor champion Zhu
Shujing (pb-17.03) with a season leading 16.89 to his credit
clearly sent the message that only the ‘fittest’ can survive in
this arena.
Shot Put:
The once Indian dominated event saw Iran’s Medhi Shahrokhi, a
silver medalist in last year’s Asian Indoor Games, lead the list
of entries with a 19.13 throw marked on his name. Saurabh Vij
(18.33), with a gold from South Asian Games on his belt, join
hands with compatriot Satyendra Kumar Singh and Korea’s Shon
Hyun (18.51) to challenge the Iranian. Two other arabs, Ahmed
Gholum (Kuwait, 18.72) and Amir Alvand (Iran, 18.26) are also
within the reach of a podium finish.
Discus Throw:
India’s Vikas Gowda leads the field. 6th at both Commonwealth
Games and Asian Games in 2006, Gowda improved his national
record to 64.96 recently. Iran’s Abbas Samimi, the Busan Asiad
silver medalist in 2002 (4th at Doha-2006) had a personal best
of 64.98m, but was just short of Gowda in his season’s best
pegged at 63.82m, will not leave the Indian take it for granted.
China fielded its strong-man Wu Tao, the world junior champion
in 2002 as well as Asian Games (2002) and World University Games
(2003) gold medalist to make its mighty presence known. |
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AGP 2007: Women’s event-wise preview (by
Ram. Murali Krishnan)
Women athletes look stronger in this year’s Asian Grand Prix as
the line-up includes six defending Asian Games champions, World
and Asian junior champions, as well as two former World Youth
Championship gold medalists. The following are the event-wise
preview based on the provisional list of entries provided by the
Asian Athletics Association.
100m:
Khubbieva Guzel (Uzbekistan) dominated the 2006 series of AGP
with hat-trick of victories over the 200m. To cap it all she
went on to win the 100m and declared “fastest woman” in the
Asian Games, clocking 11.27 secs.
Sri Lanka’s Olympic medalist Susanthika Jayasinghe was beaten to
second place behind the uzbek at Doha and also in the first leg
of AGP-2006 at Bangkok. Susanthika had a personal best of 11.04
secs as against Khubbieva’s 11.26s. However, backed with
experience, the Sri Lankan ace won gold medals in the first-ever
Lusofonia Games at Macau and South Asian Games at home in
Colombo in 11.33 secs. Susanthika is back with intense training
and raring to perform.
India’s veteran sprinter Poonam Tomar, Vietnamese Vu Thi Huong
besides two of the Thai’s Supavadee Khawpeak (pb-11.33s) and
Jutamass Thavoncharoen (pb-11.47) could pull a surprise or two.
400m:
Olga Tereshkova is a clear favourite in the absence of India’s
Pinki Paramanik, who outclassed the Kazakh in Bangalore and Pune
legs of the AGP last year. Another Indian entrant Satti Geetha,
a member of the gold winning relay quartet at Doha, pulled out
at the last minute pave way for an easy outing to Olga this
year. Her ‘unknown’ compatriot Tatyana Khadjimuratov and
Uzbekistan’s Zamira Amirova, two-time bronze medalist in 800m at
Asian Games (2002 and 2006) will have very little to challenge
the champion athlete.
1,500m:
India’s Sinimol Paulose had a season’s best of 4:11.66 to lead
the challenge. The Doha bronze medalist will have to fight it
out with the Huang Jing of China (pb 4:10.13), Kazakhstan’s
Svetlana Lukasheva (4:13.83) and Viktoriya Yalovtseva, besides
her training partner Sushma (4:13.22) and another Chinese
Xiaomei Long, the asian junior champion over 800m.
100m Hurdles:
The Kazakh duo of Natalya Ivoninskaya (13.02) and Anastasiy
Vinogradova (13.11), respectively the 4th and 5th placed
athletes in Doha Asiad, will log horn with each other for the
top honours. With the fabulous Malaysian SEA Games champion Moh
Siew Wei opted to out from the race, another Indian veteran
Anuradha Biswal will work her way for a podium finish.
High Jump:
There was an interesting battle between Marina Aitova ((KAZ) and
Tatyana Efimenko (KGZ) last year. They won the AGP titles
between them with both scaled the identical height of 1.94m
twice.
With Efimenko not entered the fray in 2007, the Asian Games gold
medalist Aitova to look for a challenge from her colleague Anna
Ustinova (PB: 1.92) and Bui Thi Nhung of Vietnam (PB: 1.94). The
appearance of World junior champion Svetlana Radzivil
(Uzbekistan) and local star Neong-Rothai Chaipetch, the Asian
Indoor Games victor will set the stage for a keen competition.
Triple Jump:
The women’s triple jump, together with 1,500m and javelin throw,
makes a ‘debut’ in AGP this year.
The top two from 2006 Asian Games, Xie Limei (CHN, 14.54) and
Anastasiya Juravleva (UZB, 14.55), with two more 14+ jumpers in
Li Qian (China, 14.16) and Yelena Parfyonova (Kazakhstan, 14.23)
make the fair interesting for the fans at the jumping pit.
India’s Anisha K. Vijayan pulled out at the last minute.
Shot Put:
Asiad gold medalist Li Ling is a cut above the rest with her
personal best 19.05 and season leading 18.81m throws.
Doha bronze medallion Lin Chia-Ying (Taipei, 16.76), together
with Lee Mi-Young (Korea, 17.62) and Iolanta Ulyeva (Kazakhstan,
17.82) make the “elite club” of competitors on the rings.
Javelin Throw:
What makes one more interesting than the competition from the
real legends. Thailand, one of the permanent hosts of the Asian
GP series, is fielding a national heroine in Buoban Pamang—the
Asian Games gold medllist in this event at Doha—to challenge two
former World Youth Championship winners from China, Xue Juan
(2003) and Zhang Li (2005). With both Xue (62.93) and Buoban
(61.31) already have better marks to their credit, the young
Zhang Li also expected to throw 60m for a ‘ticket’ to Beijing!
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June 10,2007: Asian
Grand Prix series 2007
In about a week’s
time the 2007 series of Asian Grand Prix will take off at
Bangkok, Thailand. The first of three-leg series will be held
at Thai capital on June 19. The Indian cities of Guwahati and
Pune are hosting the next two legs on June 23 and 27
respectively.
The Asian Grand Prix,
started at Hyderabd (India) on May 18, 2002 had been an
important event on the Asian Athletics Association’s calendar
forever.
The 2007 series will
have as much as 150 athletes from about 23 member-federations of
AAA vie for honours. Apart from Asian countries, athletes from
a few invited nations like Zimbabwe are also likely to take part
in this year’s Asian GP series, en route to their preparation
for the World Championships—which will be held in the Asian
continent at Osaka, Japan 25th August to 2nd September.
The 2007 series of
Asian Grand Prix will have Asian Games champions from Doha 2006
in the following events—
Guzel Khubbieva
(Uzbekistan, 100m), Olga Tereshkova (Kazakhstan, 400m), Marina
Aitova (Kazakhstan, High jump), Xie Limei (China, Triple jump),
Li Ling (China, Shot put) among the women. Two former world
youth champions from China, Xue Juan (2003) and Zhang Li (2005)
are taking part in javelin throw.
Among the men, Asian
games gold medalist Li Yanxi (China) will figure in triple jump
along with 2002 champion Fawzi Al-Shammari (Kuwait) in 400m flat
and two time world championship bronze medalist Dai Tamesue of
Japan in 400m hurdles.
The men’s triple jump
will also have Asian games silver medalist Roman Valiyev of
Kazakhstan and India’s Renjith Maheswari. |
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