Lankan athletes dazzle
Laslie FERNANDO reporting from Dhaka, Bangladesh
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Chaminda Wijekoon with the 1,500m gold medal.
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Sri Lanka athletes put up a tremendous performance to win two gold,
three silver, one bronze at the 11th South Asian Games athletics held at
the Bangabandu National Stadium on Saturday.
The first day of the athletic events, Chaminda Wijekoon, Sri Lanka
overall captain collected the first gold in the men's 1,500 metres.
He retained the title won in the Colombo Games 2006. Chaminda started
his campaign confidently and led from the rest and maintained the lead
to breast the tape.
He ran with lot of endurance, strength, stamina and power to beat his
opponents with a time of 4 minutes 10.01 seconds.
P.H. Chamal finished third 4 minutes 10:97 seconds in a bronze.
Two medals in 1,500 metres.
Sri Lanka athletes continued to show their prowess winning both gold
and silver medals in women's 200 metres.
Chandrika Subashani a very experienced athlete who has participated
in several international meets won her first gold with a well calculated
and controlled run 24.49 seconds. Her teammate Premila Priyadarshani won
the silver with a time of 24:63 seconds.
Both Chandrika and Premila took the lead on the turn and Chandrika
was first to breast the tape.
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Heshan Unamboowa - Gold medallist of the 100 metre Backstroke at
the eleventh edition of the SAF games proudly displaying his
medal. Pic by Prince Gunasekera |
Former Madampe Central School student, now attached to Sri Lanka Air
Force, Chandrika told the ‘Sunday Observer’ it was a very good
opportunity to achieve success to win a gold and her aim is now to run
in the 2012 London Olympics.
Chandrika is expected to win a double gold when she compete in the
400 metres.
Shehan Ambepitiya won the silver in the 200 metres timing 21:19
seconds in a tight race. It was once again weak start that prevented a
Ambepitiya gold.
Nayana Prasad Dharmarathne went on to capture the silver in the long
jump with a leap of 7.25 metres.
Our athletes feat was creditable winning 2 gold, 3 silver and one
bronze.
Heshan - a gold
Heshan Unamboowe gave Sri Lanka the second gold medal in swimming
winning 100 metresback stroke establishing a new game record at the
National Swimming Complex, Mirpur.
Heshan who won a silver and bronze on first day of swimming had it
easy in the 100 metres backstroke.
He got off to a flying start and swam gracefully to touch in first
with record breaking time of 58.98 seconds.
Heshan erased off the record held by Andrew Abeysinghe who 'clocked'
01:00:11 seconds in the 2006 Colombo Games.
Miniruwani Samarakoon who bagged a silver on Friday collected a
bronze in the 100 metres butterflystroke timing 01:10:38 seconds.
Conrad Francis finished fifth in the 50 metres butterfly (26:72
seconds), Samantha Priyadarshana won the fifth position in 50 metres
freestyle, 25:36 seconds. D.N. Weerasinghe fifth in the 400 metres
freestyle, 4:26:39.
Sri Lanka is in second position in the swimming medal list 2 gold, 3
silver and 2 bronze. India lead with 8 gold, 4 silver and 1 bronze.
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[Lanka take 7 medals]
Sri Lanka bagged a total of seven medals on day 8 of the 11th SAG,
here yesterday. The medal tally increased to 36 with 3 gold, 2 silver
and one bronze.
Sri Lanka has bagged 6 gold, 14 silver, bronze and lying fourth in
the countrywise medal tally.
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