Somasiri And Gamage Bring Home Two Bronze!

Unlike the previous edition of the World Para Athletics Championship, this year's edition didn't see the Javelin Throwers Dinesh Priyantha Herath or Samitha Dulan Kodithuwakku, but two not so new names managed to finish on the podium and will bring home two medals when they return back to Sri Lanka!

Pradeep Somasiri didn't just finish in 3rd place in the T46 Men's 1500m final, but also broke the Asian record as he clocked 3 minutes 53.77 seconds, erasing the previous record held by Ning Qin (China) back in 2008 at the Beijing Paralympics, where he clocked 3 minutes 58.23 seconds.

A few days before, Nuwan Indika Gamage won the Bronze medal in the T44 Men's Long Jump with a seasonal best performance of 6.46m. This is his second medal at the World Para Athletics Championship, as he won the Bronze medal in the T44 100m final last year. Although he couldn't make the final cut in the 100m or 200m, he achieved a seasonal best in the 200m.

As previously mentioned that Sri Lanka's contingent this year didn't feature the Javelin Throwers, the team consisted of three other athletes. Janani Dhananjana, the youngest of the lot and only schoolgirl to compete last year, finished with a personal best timing of 12.88 seconds in the Women's T47 100m Heats, and recorded a personal best distance of 5.36m in the Women's T47 Long Jump to finish 7th in the finals.

New face Buddhika Fernando finished 7th place in the T47 Men's Long Jump with a personal best distance of 6.70m. Unfortunately for Palitha Bandara who won the Bronze medal last year in the F63 Shot Put, he could only muster a seasonal best distance of 14.07 m for 4th place.

Overall, all five athletes achieved at least a seasonal best performance in at least one event they took part in, and a special thanks goes out to SriLankaSports.com who is also the Media Director for NPCSL and the former Editor of the author.