Sunil Joliya Jinabhai of Gujarat broke the National Games record in Steeplechase to clinch the gold medal while Asian Games triple-medallist Vithya Ramraj brought her season to a stellar finish with two gold medals in 400m hurdles and mixed relay at 37th National Games Goa 2023 at Sports Authority of Goa Athletics Stadium at Bambolim on Friday.
Elsewhere, swimmers Nina Venkatesh and Dhinidhi Desinghu of Karnataka extended their 100 per cent win record to claim their fifth gold medal at the 37th National Games.
Jinabhai finished the 3000m Steeplechase with a timing of 8:37.15 s to break the National Games record of 8:43.05s in the name of Shankar Lal Swami, which was set at the last edition in Gujarat.
Asian Games medallist Vithya Ramraj of Tamil Nadu won the gold medal in the women’s 400m Hurdles with a timing of 56.88 s while Gujarat’s Dhaval Utekar won the gold in the men’s category with a timing of 51.20s.
Vithya Ramraj dipped ahead of Jisna Mathew at the finish line to give Tamil Nadu the gold in the 4×400 M Mixed Relay event ahead of Kerala to conclude some brilliant action in athletics at the Games.
Preeti Lamba of Haryana secured the gold in the women’s 3000m Steeplechase with a timing of 10:19.78 s. In the men’s Javelin throw, Asian Games silver medallist, Kishore Kumar Jena had to be satisfied with a bronze medal as SSCB’s Shivpal Yadav and D.P Manu won gold and silver medal respectively.
Olympian Sivpal Singh registered his best attempt at 81.17 metres while D.P Manu finished second with an effort of 80.48 m. Jena, having already booked his Paris Olympics berth during Hangzhou Asian Games, was distant third with a throw of 78.47 m.
Upcoming International High-jumper Pooja of Haryana won the gold medal in the women’s High Jump with her best jump of 1.80m.
Over at the Manohar Parrikar Sports Complex Swimming Pool at Campal, Karnataka’s young swimming stars Nina Venkatesh and Dhinidhi Desinghu guided their team to gold in the mixed team 4×100 Freestyle Relay. They now have five gold medals each with one more day of competition left.
Sajan Prakash of Kerala, Srihari Nataraj of Karnataka, Bhavya Sachdeva and Kushagra Rawat of Delhi each won their third gold medals of the Games on a day where four more Games records were broken in the pool.
Sagar Bhargava piped state-mate and Paris 2024 Olympics quota winner Sarabjot Singh in a shoot-off, to win the first gold medal in Shooting, at Mandrem.
Sagar, competing in the men’s 10m Air Pistol for Haryana, held his nerve to shoot a 10.2 in his shoot-off shot, as the India international settled for silver with a weak 9.3. The two Haryanvis were tied at 238.8 at the end of the 24-shot final. Subhash Sihag of the Services won bronze with 217.3.
Haryana continued their dominance on the wrestling mat, winning five out of the six gold medals on offer with Uttar Pradesh winning the other gold.
Over at the Goa Engineering College campus, Farmagudi – Olympian Deepika Kumari qualified for the final of the Women’s Recurve event after beating Haryana’s Tamanna 6-4 in the semis. She will face Sangeeta of Haryana who won her semi-final match 6-2 against Gujarat’s Bhagora Vargishkumar.
In the men’s category, giant-killer Mukesh Boro who had beaten Olympian Atanu Das in the second round, qualified for the finals beating SSCB’s Gora Ho in the shoot-off. He will face Uttarakhand’s Kartik Rana who also created an upset in the first round beating Olympian Jayanta Talukdar. Kartik comprehensively beat Bhagwat Singh of Chhattisgarh 7-1 in the semis to book his place in the finals.
