Siddhanth breaks National record, qualifies for Worlds

Mumbai’s sprint hurdler Siddhanth Thingalaya qualified for the World Athletics Championships to be held in London in August with a record-breaking time at the Altis Invitational Meet in the United States on Saturday.

The 26-year-old ONGC officer, in Arizona, clocked 13.48s -- a national record -- which is the entry standard for the London Worlds. A year ago, he'd broken his national record of 13.54s at the same venue.

“This will be my first senior Worlds… trained so hard this year,” Siddhanth told Sportstar from the US on Sunday night.

Siddhanth narrowly missed making the cut for the Rio Olympics last year and he appeared to be out of luck early this season too when he clocked a wind-aided 13.43s for the 110m hurdles event.

“Today, it was a 0.9 wind and perfectly legal,” he said before catching a flight to Mumbai.