DAEGU, Monday. – Sri Lanka’s Christine Sonali Merrill narrowly missed a chance of making it to the semi finals of women’s 400m hurdles on day three of the 13th IAAF World Championships continued in Daegu Stadium here today. Portugal’s Vera Barbosa, who finished just ahead of Merrill at the fifth place with a timing of 56.31 seconds qualified for the semi finals.
Merrill, who won the bronze medal in her pet event at the Asian Championships in Kobe last July, clocked an unimpressive 57.05 seconds to finish sixth in her qualifying round heat worked off this morning. Competing in advantageous lane four with former junior world champion Kaliese Spencer of Jamaica on her right lane, Merrill got off to a good start but failed to capitalize on that early advantage. Spencer had a powerful last dash to win the first of the three quarter final qualifying round heats with an impressive timing of 54.93 seconds, ahead of This year’s best performer in women’s 400m hurdles Spencer missed out on a medal at the last Championships by a whisker. The 24-year-old realises that fellow Jamaican Melaine Walker although not looking brilliant in her qualifier, is fully geared up to defending her title while Lashinda Demus a two-time silver medallist is equally determined on this occasion to take home a golden one.
Speaking exclusively to the Observer Online in Daegu after the women’s 400m hurdles quarter finals, the US-based Lankan athlete said the things did not go to her liking in the last leg of the race."Times New Roman","serif";"> "Cambria","serif";">“My aim was to make it to the semi finals. But the competition level was high and I could not make the best use of the relatively good start that I picked,” she said. “I have been working really hard with strenuous training. After I won a medal at the Asian Championships, my target was to improve on my Sri Lanka national record. I could not do it here but would make every endeavour to better my feat in near future,” a determined Merrill added.
She was placed 24 th among 38 woman athletes who came under the starters orders for the five 400m hurdles qualifiers. The best timing of 54.86 seconds was registered by Melanie Walker who won the heat five, just ahead of Russian Nataliya Antyukh (54.88), who came second in the identical heat 5.
Sri Lanka’s other medallist at the 2011 Asian Championships in Kobe last month, Chaminda Wijekoon will be seen in action on day four of the IAAF World Championships here on Tuesday. Since arriving here last week, the Lankan middle distance runner has been busy at training and will be looking forward to better his personal best.