True to form, defending men’s Olympic javelin champion Neeraj Chopra unleashed a massive opening throw and qualified for the final of the competition in the Paris 2024 Games here today as the best of the twelve qualifiers.

Chopra, leading the Group B competitors as the world number two, vowed the near-capacity crowd with his brilliant first effort of 89.34 metres, which was well beyond the qualifying mark of 84 metres at the imposing Stade de France.

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The excellent effort also put Chopra well in front of all other competitors in the two-group qualification stage.

The 26-year-old, six-footer made his confident approach run and released the spear smoothly and watched it soar well over the qualifying mark with the satisfaction of crossing the first stage of his two-stage mission.

The final of the event is to be held on August 8..

All those throwing the spear 84 metres or beyond it automatically qualified.

Chopra’s compatriot Kishore Jena, however, couldn’t make the cut after coming up with two legal throws of 80.73m and 80.21m. He flunked his middle attempt.He was ninth in his group and 18th overall.

Chopra’s throw today bettered his earlier second-best effort of 89.30m that he achieved on June 14, 2022 in Finland at the Paavo Nurmi Games.

His top effort today, the best out of all competitors in both Group A and Group B, was also better than his gold-winning throw of 87.59m in the last Olympics in Tokyo.

It exceeded his world championship title-winning hurl of 88.17m in Budapest last year, but was still short of his personal best effort of 89.94m that he came up with in Stockholm, Sweden, on June 14, 2022.

It’s also the Indian army man’s season’s best throw, easily overshadowing his 88.37m done in May in Qatar.

Also through to the final from the same Group B were Anderson Peters of Grenada (88.63), Arshad Nadeem (Pakistan,86.59), Brazilian Luiz Mauricio Dasilva (85.91) and Andrian Mardare (84.13) who all qualified automatically.

In Group A, Julian Weber of Germany finished on top with a best first effort of 87.76m to qualify with his first throw. Also through with his first throw was world no 1 Jakub Vadlejch of Czechia (85.63).

Kenya’s Julius Yego (85.97) and Toni Keranen (85.27) also attained the qualifying mark with their respective third and final attempts.

The other three who made it to the finals without attaining the 84m mark were Iver Helender of Finland (83.81), Shorn Walcott of Trinidad and Tobago (83.02) and Lassi Etelatalo, also of Finland (82.91).