Arjun Waskale, Priyanka Sirakwar earn World Athletics U-20 Championships tickets

Arjun Waskale of Madhya Pradesh and Priyanka Sirakwar of Uttar Pradesh qualified for the upcoming World Athletics U-20 Championships to be held in Cali, Colombia, in the mens 1500m and womens 100m respectively during the National Federation Cup Junior Championships here on Thursday.The 18-year-old Priyanka, who hails from Agra district, clocked 11.80 seconds in the womens 100m in the opening heats.

Arjun Waskale of Madhya Pradesh and Priyanka Sirakwar of Uttar Pradesh qualified for the upcoming World Athletics U-20 Championships to be held in Cali, Colombia, in the men's 1500m and women's 100m respectively during the National Federation Cup Junior Championships here on Thursday.

The 18-year-old Priyanka, who hails from Agra district, clocked 11.80 seconds in the women's 100m in the opening heats. The qualifying mark for the August 1-6 world event is 11.90 seconds. Aman Khokhar (Uttar Pradesh) was the fastest qualifier from the men's 100m heats, clocking 10.62 seconds, 0.02 seconds adrift of the World Athletics U-20 Championships qualifying mark. The 18-year-old Waskale had the double joy as he not only met the world junior event qualification standard, but also broke Sunil Dawar's meet record by clocking a personal best time of 3:46.31s in the men's 1500m. Gagan Singh of Haryana made his U-20 debut at the national level with a gold as he won the 5000m race in 14:44.92s, a shade slower than the time he clocked in the state U-20 meet.