Bhubaneswar: Bhubaneswar Indoor Stadium has proved a happy hunting ground for Tamil Nadu’s pole vaulter Baranica Elangovan. Within a span of nearly five weeks, the 29-year-old improved the national record twice at the same venue.
Baranica cleared the 4.23m milestone Sunday, to better her own national record of 4.22m set at the inaugural edition of National Indoor Athletics Championships held in the last week of March.
She crossed 4.23m on her third attempt while Nitika of Madhya Pradesh and Blessy Kunjumon of Kerala both cleared 3.90m to share second place.
“It was another good day for me,” says Baranica of setting a new benchmark in women’s pole vault. Baranica has shifted from Tamil Nadu to Odisha and practices at Bhubaneswar.
Odisha athletes made a strong impact at the championships, with Purnima Hembram finishing as the winner of women’s pentathlon.
She secured 3835 points while Jashbir Nayak bagged bronze in the men’s heptathlon.
In the men’s heptathlon, Thowfeeq N of NCOE Trivandrum topped the field with 5350 points, followed by Usaid Khan of Army (5288 points) and Jashbir (5250 points).
The men’s U20 heptathlon title went to Kirthik Vasan S of Tamil Nadu with 4609 points, ahead of Jinoy Jayan of NCOE Trivandrum (4518 points) and Aryan Parkash of Madhya Pradesh (4509 points).
In the women’s U20 pentathlon, Jaskiran Kaur of Uttarakhand secured top honours with 3272 points, followed by Priya of Haryana (3133 points) and Alfaz Kaur Grewal of Punjab (3066 points).
The women’s pentathlon saw Purnima winning the gold with 3835 points, followed by Isha Chandra Prakash of Uttarakhand, securing second place with 3671 points, while Bidisha Kundu of West Bengal finished third with 3600 points.
