Lucknow, Mar 7 (PTI) Uttar Pradesh's promising pole vaulter Kuldeep Kumar is all set to showcase his skills during the National Junior U20 Federation Athletics Championships starting here from Friday.

The competition concludes on March 10.

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The competition will be the last event for budding athletes to earn a ticket to next month's Asian U20 Junior Athletics Championships, to be held in Dubai from April 24 to 27.

For the past two years, Kuldeep has been quite consistent in pole vault in the age group category.

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The international pole vaulter from Varanasi had scaled a height of 5.17m in November last to better the 5.10m qualification criteria set by the Athletics Federation of India (AFI) for the continental competition.

"My training has been on expected lines," Kuldeep said of his preparation for the Lucknow meet.

"Hopefully I should be able to scale new heights in Lucknow."

At the third Khelo India University Games held last year in Lucknow, he finished second with a height of 4.80m.

Kuldeep has to sustain his efforts of 5.17m in Lucknow to stay on course to win a gold medal and a berth to Asian U20 meet.

However, on his way to the gold medal he will face a stiff challenge from Madhya Pradesh's Dev Meena, whose gold medal winning performance at the 2023 Goa National Games was 5.16m. Kuldeep finished second in Goa with a height of 5m.

As many as 40 budding athletes were successful in breaching AFI's qualification standards in their respective events for the Asian U20 meet in 2023 in different competitions.

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