Gold Coast (Australia) April 13 (IANS) Indian athletes Neeraj Chopra Vipin Kashana and Jinson Johnson entered the finals of their respective events at the 21st Commonwealth Games here on Friday.
Chopra and Kashana entered the final of the men s Javelin Throw. Johnson did well to qualify for the medal round of the men s 1 500 metre event.
Chopra hurled the javelin to a distance of 80.42 metres to take the second place in Group A of the qualification round. Kashana registered 78.88m to qualify as the third thrower in Group B.
Hamish Peacock of Australia was the best performer in the qualifying stage recording 81.22m to finish at the top spot in Group B. Arshad Nadeem of Pakistan registered a new national record of 80.45 to finish second.
Later Johnson ran a superb race to finish second in Heat 2 of the men s 1 500m.
The Kerala athlete powered into the lead in the first round. He held onto the lead till around the halfway stage when he was overtaken by a group of three runners including eventual winner Elijah Motonei Manangoi of Kenya.
The Indian however accelerated well towards the end to take the second spot with a time of 3 minutes and 47.04 seconds.
Elijah was well ahead in front with 3:46.82.
--IANS
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