Jyothi Yarraji breaks 100m hurdles national record in Cyprus meet

The 22-year-old Andhra athlete won the gold in Cyprus International Meet at Limassol under a head wind speed of 0.1m/s.

New Delhi:A month after her wind-assisted effort was not registered as a national record, hurdler Jyothi Yarraji has finally made the mark her own while winning a 100m event in Cyprus with a timing of 13.23 seconds. The 22-year-old Andhra athlete on Tuesday won the gold in Cyprus International Meet at Limassol under a head wind speed of 0.1m/s.

The old national record of 13.38 seconds was in the name of Anuradha Biswal since 2002. The Cyprus Meet is a World Athletics Continental Tour Challenger category D event. Jyothi, who trains under Joseph Hillier at Odisha Athletics High Performance Center in Bhubaneswar, had clocked 13.09 seconds during the Federation Cup in Kozhikode last month but since the wind speed was +2.1 m/s, more than the permissible +2.0 m/s, it was not counted.

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In 2020 also, Jyothi had run below Biswal's national record time as she clocked 13.03 seconds at the All India Inter-University Athletics Championships in Moodbidri, Karnataka. But that was also not counted as NR as National Anti-Doping Agency did not test her at the meet and there was no technical delegate from the Athletics Federation of India present at the meet.

Another Odisha Athletics High Performance Center trainee Amlan Borgohain, who smashed the national record during the Kozhikode Federation Cup, finished third in men's 200m race with a time of 21.32 seconds. The 24-year-old from Assam had clocked 20.52s in Kozhikode. In other result, Lili Das won the women's 1500m race with a time of 4 minutes 17.79 seconds.

Jyothi comes from a humble background as her father Suryanarayana is working as a private security guard and her mother Kumari is a domestic help. Her life changed after she got selected for the Sports Authority of India (SAI) hostel at Hakimpet, Telangana after her schooling.

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Jyothi soon started showing results with her first national gold medal coming in 100m hurdle at the 32nd National Junior Athletic Championship in Coimbatore in November 2016. She went on to prove her mettle in the 4x400 metres relay at the UP Athletics Association held in Lucknow in June, before shining at the 29th South Zone Junior Athletics in Kerala in September, 2017. She also drew attention with her gold winning performance at the 59th National Inter State Senior Athletics Championship in Lucknow in August, 2019.

PTI