Asian Games: Jyothi Yarraji clinches controversial silver at 100m hurdles
Jyothi Yarraji clinched the silver medal in women's 100m hurdles at the 2023 Asian Games on Sunday. There was a lot of drama at the start of the race as both Yarraji and China's Wu Yanni were under review after a false start. While Yarraji finished third in the race, her medal got upgraded to silver after Wu was disqualified. Here's more.
What happened at the start of the race?
Wu was in lane 5 while Yarraji was in lane 4 and during the false start, the home favorite made the first rush followed by the Indian hurdler. Initially, both of them were disqualified from the race. It confused a lot of people as generally the first defaulter is disqualified in such cases and Yarraji was second. Later, the organizers allowed them to compete.
AFI president filed a protest
Athletics Federation of India president Adille Sumariwalla later told RevSport, "This was nonsense. I will take this up at the highest level. Action will be taken against the Chinese officials. They tried to disqualify Jyothi which was outright wrong." AFI under Sumariwalla's leadership filed a protest immediately after the incident and rightfully got Yarraji's medal upgraded to silver after the Chinese hurdler was disqualified.
Jyothi finished the race in third place
Yarraji and Wu were allowed to compete and were under review. The Indian hurdler finished third behind the Chinese duo. Yarraji clocked 12.91 seconds while gold medallist China's Lin Yuwei finished with a timing of 12.74 seconds. Wu finished second before getting disqualified.
Who is Jyothi Yarraji?
Yarraji was born on August 28, 1999, in Vizag, Andhra Pradesh. She had humble beginnings until her teacher in school inspired her to be a hurdler. Yarraji won the gold at the 2020 Khelo India University Games. She broke the national record at the 2022 Limassol International athletics meet. Yarraji clocked 13.23 seconds breaking the previous record of 13.38 seconds set by Anuradha Biswal.
A look at the accolades won by Yarraji
Yarraji went on to break the National Record multiple times. She became the first Indian women hurdler to clock below 13 seconds, this made her the best Asian in 2022 and the 11th-best Asian hurdler overall. She won the gold at the 2023 Asian Athletics Championship and silver in the 200m. Yarraji won silver at the 2023 Asian Indoor Championships (60m hurdles) in Astana.
Yarraji scripted this record
As per statistician Andrew Amsan, Yarraji has clocked seven official sub-13 second 100m hurdles this year (2023) which is the most by a female Asian hurdler. She holds the national record in women's 100m hurdles clocking 12.78 seconds.
