Kazakhstan's Alina Chistyakova became the vice-champion in heptathlon at the Asian U23 Athletics Championships in China with a score of 5,737 points. This was reported by Qazaqyia.kz citing Kursiv Media.
The 22-year-old from Karaganda led after the first day of competition. On the second day, she won the long jump (6.15m), placed third in javelin (38.73m), and finished second in the final event, the 800m (2:19.27). Future champion Xinghu Hu from China stayed behind our multi-event athlete for both laps, securing gold.
Bronze medals on the final day were won by Yasmina Toksanbayeva in the 20km race walk (1:41.26), as well as our women's 4x100m and 4x400m relay teams.
Anna Shumilo, Ekaterina Puzyreva, Tatyana No, and Daria Gridasova completed the lap in 50.90 seconds, losing seven seconds to the champion Chinese team. The same Shumilo, Anastasia Tsvirkunova, Ekaterina Koloda, and Maria Shuvalova took third place, each running a lap in 3:37.65. The Indian quartet won with a time of 3:33.62.
Ayana Bolatbekkyzy and Akbayan Nurmamet did not reach the podium in the 1500m, finishing fourth (4:22.92) and fifth (4:23.33, personal best) respectively. Elmira Kalimullina also finished fifth in the 20km race walk (1:50.38).
The Asian U23 Athletics Championships were held for the first time in this age category. The nearest reserve of national teams, among which the hosts clearly stood out, competed in 45 events.
Kazakhstan sent 21 athletes to Ordos – 17 women and 4 men. Earlier, medals were won by Anastasia Rypakova (silver, long jump) and Maxim Balabin (bronze, pole vault).