Controversial teen sprinter Dutee Chand set the track ablaze in the qualifiers itself with a new meet record even as Services Sports Control Board tightened its grip around the overall title by maintaining the top position in the 35th National Games here on Tuesday. At the athletics arena, Dutee, representing Odisha, broke the meet record in the heats, clocking 11.83sec in the women's 100m sprint to better the previous mark of 11.84sec set by H M Jyothi in the 2011 edition. The 19-year-old is fighting a legal battle to compete internationally again after she was banned for failing a controversial gender test.
Dutee, who made the 100m finals later in the evening, is competing in domestic events courtesy last year's interim order from the Court for Arbitration of Sport, which cleared her to participate in home tournaments until a final verdict in January determines whether she can run again internationally. Another meet record was shattered in the men's long jump where Ankit Sharma claimed the gold medal after clearing 8.04m to better the 7.79m mark set by Kerala's Shyam Kumar in 1994. Tamil Nadu's Premkumar Kumaravel was the silver-medallist with an effort of 7.68m, followed by Karanataka's Samsheer S E (7.46m).
In the women's 1500m run, Uttar Pradesh's Monika Chaudhary upstaged pre-race favourite Sini Markose of Kerala to notch up the gold medal, accelerating in the final few meters to surprise the field. Monika clocked 4:22.01sec, beating Sini, who finished in 4:23.03sec to nab the silver medal. Haryana's Sushma Devi won the bronze medal with a timing of 4:24.01sec.
The women's hammer throw gold went into Odisha's kitty with Sarita Singh's effort of 56.47m. The silver and bronze went to Punjab's K M Rachna (56.08) and Ritu Dhiman (55.60m) of Uttar Pradesh. There was a surprise in men's shotput finals, as national record holder Om Prakash (Haryana) had to content with a bronze after being upstaged by statemate Inderjeet Singh. Om Prakash cleared 17.95m, way below his best of 20.69m.
Indeerjeet, on the other hand, came up with an effort of 20.14m to finish on top, while Uttar Pradesh's Satyendra Kumar managed the silver with a distance of 18.24m. In the hockey competition, SSCB entered the men's summit clash with a thumping 5-1 triumph over Jharkhand. SSCB will square off against Odisha in the final after the eastern state scripted a stunning fightback to beat Haryana in sudden death. On penalties, Haryana cracked under pressure to miss their chance and bow out.
Haryana and Punjab will clash in final of the women's event after getting the better of Jharkhand and Odisha in their respective last-four stage clashes. Haryana beat Jharkhand 3-2. In the other semifinal, Punjab blanked Odisha 3-0. The Triathlon concluded on Tuesday with the mixed team competitions in which Manipur won the gold medal, leaving Gujarat and Maharashtra in the second and third position respectively.
At Kochi's badminton court, Kerala claimed the men's team gold medal, while the women's top honours were notched by Telangana. In the men's final, Kerala defeated Haryana 3-2 even as the home state's women went down 0-2 against Telangana. In the cycling events, the 10km scratch race elite women's race Kerala swept the podium with Mahitha Mohan (20:15.23sec), Rejani V (20:15.23sec) and Bismi S (20:14.92sec) finishing first, second and third respectively.
The men's 15km scratch race was won by SSCB's Satbir Singh (21:31.51sec), ahead of Tamil Nadu's C Rajesh (21:31.64sec) and Haryana's Pankaj Kumar (21:31.84sec). In the wushu competitions, Madhya Pradesh's Anjul Namdeo clinched the men's gold with 9.21 points, Meghalaya's W Tomba Singh (8.81 points) settled for the silver. SSCB's Aditya Kumar finished a close third with 8.50 points. The women's gold in this event went to Manipur's Chaobi Devi (8.13 points), beating Madhya Pradseh's Swecha Jatav (7.52 points) and Assam's Alpana Boro (7.36 points).