Dilhani secures 32nd place in javelin throw

By Susil Premalal  

Sri Lanka’s Dilhani Lekamge finished 16th out of 16 competitors in the Women’s javelin throw Group ‘A’ Qualification round of the 2024 Paris Olympic Games in France yesterday.  

The Hangzhou Asian Games Silver Medallist produced an effort of 53.66m and failed to advance to the next round of the competition.  

South Africa’s Jo-An van Dyk finished on top of Group ‘A’ with 64.22m and qualified for the semi-finals.   

Dilhani, of course, came into the Olympic Games having produced a personal best performance of 61.57m but never looked like repeating that effort.   

As a result, Dilhani, competing in her first Olympic Games, had to settle for 32nd place overall in the Women’s javelin throw event.  

Dilhani became the last Sri Lankan athlete to make her exit from the Paris Games after a satisfying performance from 400m runner Aruna Darshana on the previous day.  

Darshana initially finished fifth in the second semi-final with a time of 44.75s but was later disqualified for a lane infringement.  

The Sri Lankan Olympic contingent included three athletes, two swimmers and one badminton player.  

Badminton player Viren Nettasinghe participated in the Men’s Singles while swimmers Kyle Abeysinghe and Ganga Senevirathne participated in the Men’s 100m freestyle and Women’s 100m backstroke events respectively.  

In addition, Hangzhou Asian Games Gold Medallist Tharushi Karunarathna was placed eighth in the Women’s 800m first round with a time of 2:07.76s and clocked 2:06.66s to finish seventh in the repechage round.