As a result, Indian athletics started its campaign at the prestigious World Athletics U20 Championships on a good note with the 19-year-old javelin thrower Ashish Yadav winning the silver medal and opening up the medals list for India. He was the second Indian male javelin thrower to win a silver medal at this high-profile event. The only other Indian who did so before was the two-time Olympic gold medalist Neeraj Chopra who won the gold medal and set the world junior record of 86.48 metres at the 2016 edition in Poland.
Yadav kept calm and collected in the final and got the silver medal with a solid throw of 74.09 meters, and while he was 40 centimeters short of his personal record of 74.49 metres (which he had clinched last March at Indian Open Throws Competition in Patiala) he managed to hold off the pressure from the strong international players. Indian finalist T. Dharanidharan also had good athletic skills and got a good sixth place in the men's javelin final with a strong throw of 72.35 meters. The gold medal was taken by South Africa’s Jan-Hendrik Heymans who took the spear to 80.50 meters to win the U20 World title. Dominica’s Addison James got the bronze medal with a solid throw of 73.89 meters.
Apart from the javelin runway, other Indian athletes had mixed success in track and field events. Mohommed Ashfaq, who had earlier shocked the world before by breaking the men’s U20 national record in the 400-meter first-round heat with 45.81 seconds, struggled and was eighth in the final with 46.20 seconds. A gold medal in quarter mile race went to the American sprinter Jayden Deleon who broke the championship record with 44.47 seconds and second place went to his teammate Quincy Wilson with 44.62 seconds, and third place to South Africa's Leendert Koekemoer.
Pooja Singh was a national senior record holder in the women's high jump final. The 19-year-old, who currently holds a national senior record of 1.93 meters, successfully cleared the bar at 1.79 meters on day three of the competition. All 14 athletes from two qualification groups who reached the 1.79 meters mark were able to get their place in the final. The men's long jump category was much better with Shahnavaz Khan and Jithin Arjuna both getting into the final. Shahnavaz was very solid and he won 4 out of 5 in qualification Group A and 5 overall with 7.73 meters leap in his third and final attempt. Jithin also secured a place in the medal round for winning the last qualification spot (12th for the whole team) and a 7.57 meter jump on his final attempt. Italy's Daniele Inzoli was the only person to qualify 8 m above the automatic qualification mark in both groups and he took advantage of a huge jump of 8.15 m. But the women's javelin camp was disappointed Poonam did not make it to the final and finished eighth in her group and 13th in the overall table with a best throw of 48.81 m.
