Kiran Pahal in action© X (Twitter)
India's Kiran Pahal failed to book an automatic semifinal spot in women's 400m after finishing seventh in her heat race of the Paris Olympics on Monday and she will now run in repechage round. Kiran, who turned 24 on Monday, clocked 52.51 seconds which was well below her season's and personal best of 50.92 seconds. World champion Marileidy Paulino of Dominica won the heat with a time of 49.42, followed by Aaliyah Butler (50.52) of USA and Susanne Gogl-Walli (50.67) of Austria. Top three in each of the six heats advanced to semifinal.
All the others -- except for DNS (Did Not Start), DNF (Did Not Finish) and DQ (Disqualified)-- moved to the repechage round to be held on Tuesday.
Pahal had made direct qualification to Paris Olympics after clocking her personal best of 50.92 seconds in the National Inter-State Championships in June, A repechage round was introduced in Paris Olympics to all individual track events from 200m to 1500m, including the hurdles events. The new format replaced the earlier one where some athletes advanced to the semifinals through fastest times in addition to the top placings in the first round heats.
Instead, only the athletes in the top placings will get automatic qualification and all the remaining will get a second chance to qualify for the semi-finals by participating in repechage heats.
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