Eric Cray qualified in the finals of the 400m hurdles after a third-place finish in the semifinal round of the 2018 Asian Games at the Gelora Bung Karno Stadium on Sunday night.
Visibly saving his energy for the big race set at 8pm on Monday, Cray submitted a third-best time of 50.54 in the third semifinal heat of the day, behind the scorching 49.34 of long-limbed Samba Abderrahman of Qatar and the 49.55 of India’s Dharun Attasamy.
Cray’s teammate Francis Medina was not as lucky, finishing in 51.68 seconds to place fourth during the first semifinal heat topped by Japan’s Abe Takatoshi, who clocked 49.71
Cray will be joined in the finals by Abderrahman, Attasamy, Takatoshi, Kazakhstan’s Dmitriy Koblov (50.58), Korea’s Han Sehyun (50.69), Taipei’s Chen Chieh (50.30) and India’s Santosh Kumar (50.46).
The two-time 400m hurdles champion of the SEA Games (Myanmar and Singapore) – who is coming off a gold medal in the 400M hurdles of the 2017 Asian Athletics Championships – has a personal best of 48.98.
A silver medalist in the 60m of the 2017 Asian Indoor and Martial Arts Games, Cray placed sixth in the 2014 Incheon edition of the games with a 51.47-second show, which he has already eclipsed here.
