Unheralded Tejas Shirse smashed the men's 110m hurdles national record while winning gold at the Motonet GP series, a World Athletics Continental Tour Challenger level event, with a time of 13.41 seconds in Jyvaskyla, Finland on Wednesday.
The 21-year-old Shirse broke the previous national record of 13.48 seconds set by Siddhanth Thingalaya in 2017. His earlier personal best is 13.56 seconds which he had clocked on May 9 at Vught, the Netherlands.
Shirse has not won any international medal but is the top Indian men's 110m hurdler, having claimed gold in the Federation Cup, National Inter-State Championships and National Open last year. He did not take part in this year's Federation Cup as he has been training and competing abroad.
His win on Wednesday should take him above his 61st spot in the Road to Paris list of the World Athletics.
The automatic qualifying mark for men's 110m hurdles in Paris Olympics is 13.27 seconds. Forty athletes will compete in Paris Olympics men's 110m hurdles and half of them will make the cut through world rankings.
In the same meet, Jyothi Yarraji won the women's 100m hurdles final race as she equalled her national record time of 12.78 seconds. She missed the Paris Olympics qualification time of 12.77 seconds by a whisker.
She is, however, well on course to making the Olympic cut as she is currently at 28th sport in the Road to Paris list out of the 40 athletes taking part in the Games.
