Lucknow, Mar 8 (PTI) Gaurav Bhaskar Bhosali of Maharashtra and Gujarat's Shilpa Dihora achieved the Asian U20 qualification mark on way to gold medals in men's and women's 3000m race respectively at the National Junior U20 Federation Athletics Championships here on Friday.

While Gaurav clocked 8:40.13s, Shilpi came up with a timing of 9:53.23s on the opening day of the three-day meet.

Also Read | Messi Saves the Day! Argentina Grandma Survives Hamas Attack by Talking About Lionel Messi (Watch Video).

Besides the two, Madhya Pradesh duo of Vikas Kumar Bind (8:40.55s) and Saud Hasan (8:41.57s) claimed the silver and bronze medals to also achieve the qualifying mark.

In women's 3000m race, Prachi Devkar of Maharashtra and Haryana's Muskan produced timings of 9:53.76s and 9:55.13s to win the silver and bronze medals and make the cut.

Also Read | Mike Tyson vs Jake Paul: Important Stats, Live Streaming, Telecast, Venue, Date All You Need To Know About Boxing Match.

In men's 3000m, the Asian qualifying mark was 9:16.00s, while 10:00.69s is the cut off in the women's category.

Exciting contests were witnessed on the opening day with several athletes catching the eye of the Athletics Federation of India (AFI) selection panel as they achieved the Asian U20 qualification criteria set by the AFI on day one.

The men's 400m semifinals was also exciting with three competitors crossing the finish line below the qualification standards to stay in the race for national team berths.

The Asian qualification time in men's 400m is 48.10 seconds.

Nikhil Suhas Dhake of Maharashtra clocked 47.95s in semis, while Bapi Hansda of Odisha (47.51s) and Delhi's Aman Chaudhary (47.86s) were other two runners who were successful in achieving their goals on the opening day.

In the women's 100m preliminary round, none of the athletes could achieve the qualification mark of 11.90s. In men's heats, no one came close to the 10.50s qualifying mark.

Away from the track, men's preliminary long jump event saw home favourite Shahnavaz from Uttar Pradesh record a leap of 7.38m to lead the finalists and better the 7.30m qualification mark.

Shahnavaz's performance ranks him hot favourite to win the long jump title.

The performance in men's discus throw qualification round hints that the final will be an exciting contest.

Earlier in the men's 10,000m race, Vinod Singh of Madhya Pradesh won the gold medal with a time of 30:13.00s. Amardeep Pal of Uttar Pradesh claimed the silver clocking 30:30.14s and Kripashankar Lalmani of Manipur took home the bronze medal at 30:31.68s.

The 25-lap event doesn't feature in the Asian U20 schedule.

The three-day competition here is the last event for budding athletes to earn a ticket for next month's Asian U20 Junior Athletics Championships scheduled to be held in Dubai from April 24 to 27.

(The above story is verified and authored by Press Trust of India (PTI) staff. PTI, India’s premier news agency, employs more than 400 journalists and 500 stringers to cover almost every district and small town in India.. The views appearing in the above post do not reflect the opinions of LatestLY)