No 200m semis spot for Singapore's Shanti Pereira after clocking 23.45s in second-chance heat

PARIS: Sprinter Shanti Pereira’s Paris Olympics campaign ended on Monday (Aug 5) after she clocked a time of 23.45s in the repechage heats.

At the Stade de France, Singapore’s sprint queen finished last out of seven competitors in heat 1.

Pereira’s personal best and national record stands at 22.57s, while her season’s best is 23.17s.

There were four repechage heats on Monday, with six slots up for grabs.

Only the athletes who topped each heat qualified for the semi-finals, as well as the next two with the fastest times across all four heats.

The repechage round is part of a new format for certain events. It replaces the old system where athletes with the fastest remaining times go through.

This marks the end of a difficult meet for the Asian Games 200m gold medallist who had her Olympics preparation cruelly curtailed by a stress injury in her fibula.

On Sunday, Pereira missed out on automatic qualification in the same event after finishing last out of eight athletes in her heat with a time of 23.21s. 

She was 31st out of 45 competitors.

Earlier in the Games, Pereira failed to advance to the 100m semi-finals, finishing 55th out of 72 athletes overall. Her time of 11.63s saw her place 7th out of nine runners in her heat. Her national record stands at 11.20s.

Last year was a career-defining one for Pereira.

At the Hangzhou Asian Games, she won the women’s 200m final – Singapore’s first athletics gold medal since 1974. 

Days before that, Pereira ended Singapore’s nearly 50-year wait for a track and field medal at the Asian Games, after she won a silver in the 100m. 

Pereira notched a sprint double at the Asian Athletics Championships in July and also became the first Singaporean woman to win both the 100m and 200m events at the SEA Games