Pole vaulter Rosy breaks national record; Aldrin beats injured Sreeshankar for long jump gold; Amlan, Jyothi too shine in National Games

Pole vaulter Rosy Meena Paulraj of Tamil Nadu turned out to be the unlikely star of the athletics competition in the National Games as she shattered the national record en route winning gold here on Saturday.

The 24-year-old Rosy cleared 4.20m to go past VS Surekhas earlier national mark of 4.15m set in 2014.

Her two Tamil Nadu team-mates, Pavitha Vengatesh and Baranica Elangovan were distance second and third with efforts of 4m and 3.90m respectively.

In mens long jump, Jeswin Aldrin of Tamil Nadu beat Commonwealth Games silver medallist Murali Sreeshankar of Kerala for the gold in a high-quality competition to qualify for the 2023 World Athletics Championships.

Aldrin jumped 8.26m in his sixth and last attempt to win the gold and go past the World Championships qualifying mark of 8.25m. He also had two other 8m-plus jumps — 8.07m amd 8.21m.

Sreeshankar, who won a silver in the Birmingham CWG in August and holds the national record of 8.36m, had a best jump of 7.93m, which he came up with in his first attempt. He had another jump of 7.55m before he passed on all his remaining four attempts due to hamstring injury.

“Sreeshankar has suffered a grade 2 hamstring injury. He will have to take rest for four to six weeks,” his father S Murali told

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