The 20th World Athletics Championships is set to begin in Tokyo, Japan, today. The championship will continue till the 18th of this month. The nine-day spectacle will host a multitude of events, with the Indian challenge spearheaded by star javelin thrower and double Olympic medallist Neeraj Chopra.
The Indian contingent, comprising 14 men and five women, will compete for medals across 15 events, with long-distance runner Gulveer Singh, along with Asian Championships silver medallist Pooja, to be in action in two events each.
India will begin its campaign today in the men’s and women’s 35km race walk events. Ram Baboo and Sandeep Kumar will compete in the men’s 35km race walk while Priyanka Goswami will feature in the corresponding women’s event. Pooja will run her 1500m heat race.
In the Men’s javelin throw event, besides Neeraj, Sachin Yadav, Yashvir Singh and Rohit Yadav will also be in the fray. It will be the first time that India will field four athletes in a single event at the World Championships. The world’s javelin elite will also be competing in the Championships, including newly-crowned Diamond League champion Julian Weber of Germany and Pakistan’s Arshad Nadeem.
Other top contenders are Grenadian javelin thrower Anderson Peters, Kenya’s 2015 world champion Julius Yego, Trinidad and Tobago’s 2012 Olympic champion Keshorn Walcott, Czech Republic’s Jakub Vadlejch, and Brazil’s Luiz da Silva, who recently surpassed the 90-metre mark with a 91-metre throw. The men’s javelin qualifying round is scheduled for the 17th of this month. India has won medals at the event three times, through legendary long jump athlete Anju Bobby George in 2003 and Neeraj Chopra in 2022 and 2023, and aims to build on their tally at the competition.
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