Day of records as Yadav claims javelin gold

JAVELIN thrower Sachin Yadav of Uttar Pradesh, 18-year-old high jumper Pooja Singh of Haryana and long distance runner Sawan Barwal of Himachal Pradesh rewrote National Games records and won gold medals on the concluding day of athletics competition here on Wednesday.

- AGENCIES @ Dehradun

In the absence of the likes of Neeraj Chopra and Kishore Jena, 25-year-old Yadav sent his spear to a Games-record distance of 84.39m in his fifth attempt to win the gold and establish himself as one of the top javelin throwers in the country. He bettered the earlier Games record of 82.23m set by Rajinder Singh in the 2015 edition. "My goal was to achieve the World Athletics automatic qualification mark (85.50m) but missed it," Yadav said at the post-event interaction. "I'm close to my goal and should be able to achieve 85.50m in the next competition." Yadav's 84.39m now