AFI cancels athletics team's trip Kazakhstan over 'quarantine rules', Indian Grand Prix 4 as alternative

 

Athletics Federation of India (AFI) on Wednesday announced that it will host the Indian Grand Prix 4 on 21 June in Patiala. Star sprinters Hima Das and Dutee Chand will get one homegrown occasion in their bid to meet all requirements for the Tokyo Olympics.

The choice to hold the fourth arrangement of the Indian GP was taken after the AFI's endeavors to send a 40-part group, including Hima and Dutee, for contests in Kyrgyzstan and Kazakhstan couldn't make progress because of "changed isolate rules" in those nations.

AFI President Adille Sumariwalla said "We do not want to impact the training schedule of our athletes by making them go through a quarantine process with six weeks left for the Olympic Games."

The list of events that will be conducted in the fourth IGP are 400m, 1500m, long jump, triple jump, shot put, javelin throw and 400m hurdles for men and 100m, 200m, 400m, 1500m, 5000m, discus throw, javelin throw and 4x100m relay for women.

Ten athletes in individual events, including star javelin thrower Neeraj Chopra — and the mixed 4x400m relay team have qualified for the Olympics, which opens on 23 July.

Shivpal Singh (men's javelin throw), M Sreeshankar (men's long jump), Avinash Sable (men's 3000m steeplechase), KT Irfan, Sandeep Kumar and Rahul Rohila (men's race walk), Bhawna Jat and Priyanka Goswami (women's race walk) and Kamalpreet Kaur (women's discus throw) are the other Olympic-bound athletes in individual events.