Mezbah, Shirin reign again
Mezbah Uddin Ahmed and Shirin Akter of Bangladesh Navy stretched their dominance in domestic sprint by winning gold medals in their respective 100m events on the second and final day of the 13th National Summer Athletics Championship at the Bangabandhu National Stadium yesterday.
While the two top awards went to the two Navy athletes, it was Bangladesh Army who retained their team supremacy with a tally of 48 medals including 18 gold, 17 silver and 13 bronze medals. Bangladesh Navy became runners-up with 33 medals including 12 gold, 11, silver and 10 bronze medals.
Mezbah, who came into limelight after winning gold in the 2013 Bangladesh Games, tasted his sixth successive gold medal in his favourite event, clocking in at 10.80 seconds. Three of his five previous gold medals came in the national championships while two others came in summer meets.
Mezbah's teammate Shah Emran claimed silver by clocking 10.90 seconds while Shariful Islam of Bangladesh Army finished third at 11.10 seconds.
The sixth gold medal on the trot for the country's fastest sprinter put him within one gold medal shy of the record set by Mosarraf Hossain Shamim, who had won the title seven times.
Mezbah, however, was not satisfied with his timing. “I'm not satisfied with my timing but at the same time it is not possible to produce great timing on this track because it has become old and slow,” he said.
“I didn't want to make a mistake today. I'm leaving the country for the World Championship on August 1. If I'd made any mistake, it would have been a setback for my participation in that event,” Mezbah added.
Meanwhile, Mezbah's teammate Shirin beat Sohagi Akter to claim her fifth gold medal, which also includes three others in the national meet and two in the summer meet.
Shirin clocked 12.30 seconds to retain the title of fastest woman while Sohagi took 12.40 seconds to claim the silver while Susmita Ghosh of Army managed the bronze medal.
Like Mezbah, Shirin's timing was way off her career best of 11.84 seconds which she had set in 2014.
“I feel really good to become the fastest woman of the country for the fifth time,' Shirin said. “If I can continue practice till the SA Games, I believe I can win a gold medal there. Nothing is impossible.”
Meanwhile, 2010 SA Games silver medallist Sumita Rani of Bangladesh Jail regained the women's 100m hurdles gold medal by clocking in at 15.30 seconds.
Sumita, who is considered the best female hurdler of the country for winning 12 gold medals, was ruled out of the track for the last two years due to injury.
Around 450 male and female athletes took part in 50 events of this meet, but no new national records were set during the two days.
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