Patiala: Ace sprinter Dutee Chand and Daneshwari AT will battle it out for supremacy in women’s 100 meters in the Indian Grand Prix IV scheduled on Monday. As per the entry list posted by the Athletics Federation of India (AFI) on its website, only seven sprinters, including Dutee, Dhanalakshmi and Himashree Roy, have registered for the 100m race.
In the Federation Cup Athletics meet held in March, Dhanalakshmi had upset Dutee to win gold in 100m. Dutee won silver. Dhanalakshmi will also compete in the 200m in the Indian Grand Prix IV. The event is also the Tokyo Olympics qualification event.
Promising Assam sprinter Hima Das, whose prolonged low back injury prevented her from competing in the women’s 400m race, will be seen in action in the 200m event on Monday. Besides the individual races, the women’s 4x100m relay team which includes Hima and Dutee will also be a star attraction at the event.
Only five sprinters, including Dutee, have entered the 200m. Leading 400m sprinter Anjali Devi will skip the Indian Grand Prix IV as she is yet to recover from a leg injury she had sustained in February.
The Indian women’s 4x100m relay team would have earned their Tokyo Olympics quota in March at the World Relays in Poland had their flight not been cancelled at the last moment.
Jisna Mathew, Vismaya V.K., and M.R. Poovama are favourites in the women’s 400m. The women’s 1500m race will see only two competitors — P.U. Chitra and Harmilan Bains – who are chasing the Olympic qualification mark of four minutes 04.20 seconds.
The women’s 5000m race too has also attracted only two athletes — Sudha Singh and Parul Chaudhary. In the javelin, Annu Rani will be the main attraction. She is yet to qualify for the Tokyo Olympic Games, starting on July 23.
Meanwhile, the AFI has rejected entries of as many as 16 athletes, including five in the men’s 1,500 meters event for the Indian Grand Prix IV. The AFI has set basic entry criteria in each of the events scheduled in the programme.
Maldives athletes will be the only foreign team to compete in the men’s and women’s relay competitions of the Indian Grand Prix IV. The AFI had earlier sent invitations to several Asian countries to compete at the Indian Grand Prix IV and Inter-State Meet from June 25.
