Bhubaneshwar : Sabita Toppo, the 17 year old 100M sprint hurdler from Odisha ran an impressive 14.17 to bag the silver at the Asian Youth Athletics Championship held in Kuwait , following the gold that she won in 100m hurdles at the National Youth (U-18) Athletics meet in Bhopal.
Sabita, hails from Sundergarh, Odisha, the youngest of six siblings, joined the Odisha Reliance foundation HPC in 2019, and that has had a transformational impact on her life with an improvement in her timing by more than two seconds in the years since.
Shri. Naveen Patnaik, Honourable Chief Minister of Odisha, on Twitter, congratulated Sabita on her performance. (https://twitter.com/Naveen_Odisha/status/1581152081070596099)
“Congratulate Odisha athlete, Sabita Toppo on clinching Silver medal in 100 mtr hurdles with a timing of 14.17s at the 4th Asian Youth Athletics Championships in #Kuwait. May she continue to bring glory for the State & the nation. Wish her all the best for future endeavours.”
Sabita, said, “I feel so happy winning this medal. There is a lot of hardwork and I would like to thank the Chief Minister Sir for his kind words, the support from the Odisha government and Odisha Reliance Foundation HPC and I am looking forward to improving my timing at every race and working with my coaches.”
James Hillier, Athletics Director of the Reliance Foundation Athletics Programme, said, “Sabita has been a very inspirational story. From personal setbacks to keep performing at the highest levels requires a lot of motivation and she possess an abundance of that quality. She has made tremendous improvement in her race craft working with her coach Rohit Mane, and I see a lot more potential in her, in the months to come.”
Reliance Foundations Athletics’ Journey:
Since 2017, Reliance Foundation has invested in the development of athletics through the Reliance Foundation Youth Sports program, reaching more than 5,500 educational institutes in 50+ districts across the country.
In 2018, Reliance Foundation set up Odisha Reliance Foundation Athletics HPC, a high-performance centre in partnership with the Government of Odisha, from where multiple national and international medalists and national record holders have been shaped. Recently, Jyothi Yarraji (representing India in CWG 2022) and Amlan Borgohain from the HPC broke long-standing national records.
RF has also been supporting the AFI with sports science and medicine support, with physiotherapists from Reliance Foundation accompanying the Indian contingent to the 2020 Tokyo Olympics.