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by Dinesh weerawansa

It's six days to go for the 43-nation Asian Athletic Championships to be held in Colombo in August. This is the 43rd in a series of articles in the ANCL English language newspapers, which leads the largest-ever sporting

event to be hosted by Sri Lanka. The Associated Newspapers of Ceylon Limited (ANCL) (Print media sponsor) and Dialog GSM (Sri Lanka team sponsor, official mobile communication provider and the official web designer & hoster) are two of the six Gold sponsors of the event. The entire article series of our Asiad Countdown is available on the official web-site of the meet is: http:// www.asianathletics2002.com Kuwait athletic team arrived in Colombo in the early hours of yesterday to take part at the 14th Asian Athletic Championships, to be worked off at the Sugathadasa Stadium from August 8 to 12.

The 17-member Kuwait team is the first of the 40 teams to arrive in Colombo for next week's Asian athletic extravaganza. The Kuwaitis are here more than week ahead to familiarise with local conditions. They hope to have a full work out at the Sugathadasa Stadium today. Two officials of the Saudi Arabian team too arrived in Colombo yesterday while the first member of the Qatar team will reach Colombo today.

The organisers have drawn up a special warm-up schedule for the 40 participating teams. They have been allocated different sessions at the Sugathadasa Stadium, depending on the number of athletes in each team.

Sri Lanka's home dominance in men's sprint events will be challenged by Japan, China, Qatar, Thailand and Hong Kong. Of the men's sprint events, Asian Games gold medallist Sugath Tillakaratne stands the best chance of winning a medal. Sri Lanka will be expecting a gold medal from Tillakaratne in men's 400m but it will not be that easy, considering the opposition that the Lankan lad has to face.

Tillakaratne, who won men's 400m gold medal at the 1998 Asian Games in Bangkok and 1998 Asian Championships in Fukuoka, could make his golden dream a reality, if he comes out with his brilliant best. Tillakaratne is the only Sri Lankan male athlete to hold an Asian Championship record - 44.61 seconds in winning men's 400m at Fukuoka, 1998. Tillakaratne, along with Sri Lanka national champion Rohan Pradeep Kumara and Prasanna Amarasekera will represent the hosts in men's 400m.

But his dominance will be challenged by the Japanese duo of Suguro Matsumoto (46.45) and Mukai Yukihiro (46.66). Also among the other medal prospects in men's 400m are Z. A. M. Zaiful (Malaysia), Leung Taj Wai (Hong Kong), Bakkar Saleheldin Elsafi (Qatar), Satbir Singh (India) and Ernie Candelario (Philippines). Sri Lanka's entries for men's sprint events are:

100m: Chinthaka de Soysa, K. S. Mendis, Ravindra Kumar 200m: K. S. Mendis, Joy Danushka, Prasanna Amarasekera 400m: Sugath Tillakaratne, Rohan Pradeep Kumara, Prasanna Amarasekera.

SAF Games gold medallist Chinthaka de Soysa, who regained his place in the Sri Lanka team after winning men's 100m gold at last weekend's National Championship, too is not going to find the things any easy. De Soysa clocked only 10.71 seconds in finishing first in men's 100m at the Nationals last week, but there are more than 13 competitors who have entered for his event at the Asian Championship with better season's best timing than Sri Lanka's fastest man.

True that De Soysa has a better career best timing - 10.31 seconds for the Sri Lanka record in 1995 and 10.442 for a National Championship record in 1999. But he is yet to regain that brilliant best after recovering from an ankle injury last year. Nevertheless, we must admire the courage and determination of the soldier from down south who fought back to regain his place against all odds.

Japan, Oman, Qatar, Thailand and China will pose the biggest threat to Sri Lanka's dominance in sprint events.

Japan and Thailand are bound to throw the toughest challenge to Sri Lanka in men's 100m event, one of the 14 events that Sri Lanka won record number of gold medals at the 1991 SAF Games. Sri Lanka's three entries for men's 100m are, Chinthaka de Soysa, K. S. Mendis and Ravindra Kumar.

Thailand's Sheehawong Reanchai has the best timing amongst all competitors in the official entry list for men's 100m. He has a season best timing of 10.29 seconds and a personal best of 10.23, a feat a Sri Lankan has never achieved. Then comes the two Japanese favourites - Kanno Yuta (10.30) and Tsuchie Hiroyasu (10.25).

The duo have done well this season too with timings of 10.30 and 10.40 respectively. Among the other medal prospects are Chang Wai Hung (Hong Kong - 10.37), Jo Wai Lok (Hong Kong - 10.43), A. B. Kamarudzaman (Malaysia - 10.43), Tan Kok Lin (Malaysia - 10.45) and Sophanich Vissano (Thailand - 10.38).

The Asian Championship record for men's 100m is held by Talal Mansoor (10.22 - Qatar), Asian record by Koji Ito (10.00 - Japan) and the world record by Maurice Green (9.79 - USA).

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