Olympian Sumeda Ranasinghe reached qualifying standards for the World Championships to be held in Japan with a new national record performance in the javelin throw on the second day of the second Selection Trial held at Diyagama on Sunday.
Ranasinghe cleared a distance of 85.78 metres to establish a new national record and a world lead at the Category ‘E’ event.
After throwing 74.96m and 78.24 in the first two throws Ranasinghe threw the record distance in his third throw.
Ranasinghe erased the national record held by Rumesh Tharanga who cleared 85.45 metres in 2024.
Currently training and competing in Australia, Tharanga cleared 85.41 metres on March 1 in Perth to take the world lead in the discipline. Now Ranasinghe has overtaken Tharanga to take the lead.
Trained by former national champion Pradeep Nishantha, Ranasinghe became the first male javelin thrower from Sri Lanka to compete at an Olympics we he reached qualifying standards for the Rio Games.
Now he as become the first Sri Lankan athlete in any discipline to have reached qualifying standards for the upcoming World Athletics Championship. The direct qualifying standard set for the men’s javelin is 85.50 meters. The World Athletics Championships will be held from September 13 to 21 in Tokyo.
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