Senior Schools 79th Athletic Championships:

Four new records set on day one

Chinthana WASALA

A colourful ceremony marked the opening of the 79th Senior Schools Athletic Championship for the Sir John Tarbat Trophy at the Sugathadasa Stadium, Colombo yesterday.

Four new meet records were produced while one was squalled on the first day while there were many good performances on both track and field events throughout the day.

Incidentally, all the new records came in from the field events on day one.

Thamika Kumudumali Fernando of Good Shepard Convent Panadura, accounted for the first record in the meet when heaved the shot putt to clear 12.49m in the under 20 girls’ to better her own record of 12.43m which she set last year. Then it was Royalist Charith Kapukotuwa who threw the discus to a distance of 47.45m in the under 20 boys’ event to lower the six year old record of 41.46m which belonged to K.P. Amila Perera of St. Benedict’s College Colombo. In the under 16 boys’ shot putt, Sanjana Sumanaweera of Royal Institute Colombo, rewrote the record books with his 16.45m attempt which was good enough to overcome the previous record of 15.71m.

Devni Madurapperuma of Musaeus College, Colombo was the other record breaker in yesterday’s events, throwing the dicus to a distance of 37.88m in the under 20 girls event.

In addition, L.H.S. Madushika Vijitha MV, Dikwella equaled the record in the under 18 girls’ high jump when she went over the bar at 1.68m. Lahiruni Peiris and D.D. Ranasinghe, both from Devi Balika Vidyalaya Colombo have also gone over the same height in the year 2005.

Nearly 2,500 schoolboys and girls representing 320 schools including some of the leading schools from the Northern and Eastern Provinces taking part at the three-day Championships which is due to conclude tomorrow.

The meet is organized by the Schools Athletic Association and sponsored by Nestle Lanka Limited the distributors of ‘Milo’.