Rosa Kutty fails to qualify

ATHENS, Aug 6: Rosa Kutty failed to qualify for the women’s 800 metres semi-final by an agonising .01 second to end one half of India’s feeble challenge at the sixth World Athletic Championships in the Olympic Stadium this morning.Running in the third of the five first round heats — the first two from each heat qualify alongwith six fastest finishers — Rosa Kutty could manage only the fourth place clocking two minutes 02.22 seconds and had to feel miserable after Toni Hodgkinson of New Zealand, who took the final qualifying spot, clocked 2:02.21 in finishing third in the second heat.The 32-year-old Rosa Kutty had held out hopes of at least going through the first round and a possible improvement upon the national record of 1:59.85 seconds set by Shiny Wilson in the South Asian Games in Madras in 1995.Today, Rosa Kutty kept pace with the leaders Liubov Tsyoma of Russia, Stella Jongmans (the Netherlands) and the eventual winner of the heat Letita Vriesde (Surinam). With 300 metres to go, the Indian almost caught up with Tsyoma. But she seemed in some discomfort at the start of the back straight to be pushed to fourth.