If a woman decides to do something, she can do anything and no one can stop them. 23 years old Jyothi Yarraji did the same. Jyothi made history by becoming the first Indian woman to run a legal sub-13 second time in the 100m hurdles while breaking her own record at the National Open Athletics Championships here. Yarraji, 23, of Railways, won in 12.82 seconds and, with the wind gauge reading 0.9m/s, she could not be denied her national record timing a second time.
She had won the same event at the National Games in Gandhinagar in 12.79 seconds, but she was helped by wind that exceeded the permissible limit. Her previous national record was 13.04, which she set in May.
Yarraji was unstoppable. She had already set the meet record with 13.18 seconds in the heats, breaking Anuradha Biswal’s record of 13.38 seconds set in Chennai 20 years ago.
In the final, she was well ahead of the other seven competitors by the time they reached the second hurdle and easily won.
The Railways star, who is from Andhra Pradesh and trains in Bhubaneswar, finished the season with only one fumble at the National Inter-State Championships in Chennai in June.
2nd fastest women in Asia
She was thus the second fastest Asian in the event in 2022, finishing just outside the continent’s all-time top ten list.
She rewrote the national record for the third time in 2022. On May 22, she broke Anuradha Biswal’s national record of 13.38, set in 2002, with a time of 13.11.
In Vught, the Netherlands, she set a new record of 13.04 seconds. Previously, she ran a 13.09-second time in the Federation Cup in Kozhikode but was stopped by high winds.
Later, Parshant Singh Kanhiya (Railways) claimed the men’s pole vault meet record when he cleared 5.15m.
S Siva, who broke his own national record in the recent National Games, cleared 5.00m to concede a handsome victory to Kanhiya.
