Paris Olympics 2024: Priyanka Goswami and Akashdeep Singh, competing in the 20km racewalking category, have achieved the qualifying time for both the 2023 World Athletics Championships and the 2024 Paris Olympics at the ongoing India Open National Racewalking competition in Ranchi.
In the competition held on Tuesday, Priyanka, who participated in the Tokyo Olympics in 2021, completed the race in 1:28:50 seconds, surpassing the qualifying standard of 1:29:20s set for the Budapest Worlds and Paris Olympics 2024.
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UP based Priyanka was close to breaking her own record
Priyanka was close to breaking her own national record while attempting to qualify for a marquee event. Although she was shy of surpassing her career-best timing by just 0.05 seconds, her efforts were commendable. She proved to be a tough competitor for Bhawana Jat, who missed the berth by 0.24 seconds and finished second to Priyanka at the Nationals.
Akashdeep’s story is quite different from Priyanka and Bhawana Jat. To qualify for both events, he had to put in a national record-breaking effort. Akashdeep clocked 1 hour and 19.55 seconds to finish a 20km racewalk, becoming the first Indian to achieve this feat in less than 1 hour and 20 minutes. His incredible performance broke the previous national record of 1:20.16 seconds held by Sandeep Kumar, and he qualified for the World Championships and Paris Olympics. The qualifying mark for men’s racewalking was set at 1:20.10 seconds.
Suraj Panwar misses it with just a fraction
While Akashdeep had a fantastic day, Suraj Panwar was not so lucky. He missed a spot in the Worlds and Paris Olympics by 0.01 seconds with a time of 1:20.11. It was heartbreaking for him to come so close to qualifying but fall short by just a fraction of a second.
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