Asian champion P U Chitra crashes out of 1500m in World C'ships

India's P U Chitra ran her personal best in the women's 1500m first round heats but that was not enough to advance further in the World Athletics Championships here on Wednesday. Asian champion Chitra ran 4 minutes 11.10 seconds, a tad better than her earlier personal best of 4:11.55, to finish eighth in heat number two and 30th overall out of 35 runners to crash out of the championships.

The top six in each of the three heats and the next six fastest qualify for the semifinals. The 24-year-old Chitra had won the Asian Championships gold on the same tracks in April with a time of 4:14.56. Her earlier personal best was during the National Inter-State Championships in Guwahati last year.

Hassan Sifan of the Netherlands, who has already won the 10,000m gold in this championships, led the time charts among the semifinal qualifiers with 4:03.88.