Track and field athletes led India’s Gold rush on the third day of competitions in the 13th South Asian Games as the country added a whopping 29 medals to surge ahead in the medals tally on Wednesday.
India won 15 Gold medals with athletics contributing five of them as the country’s medal tally stood at 32 Gold, 26 Silver and 13 Bronze for a total of 71.
Athletics gave 10 medals (5 Gold, 3 Silver and 2 Bronze) while six each from came from table tennis (3 Gold and 3 Silver)and taekwondo (3 Gold, 2 Silver and 1 Bronze), five from triathlon (2 Gold, 2 Silver and 1 Bronze) and two — all Gold — from kho kho.
India completely dominated in athletics yet again to take the total medal count from the discipline to 20.
Archana Suseendran won her second Gold by clinching the women’s 200m race in 23.67 seconds to add to her yellow metal in the 100m dash. Compatriot A Chandra Lekha was third with a time of 24.37 seconds.
Suresh Kumar won the men’s 10,000m race with a time of 29 minutes 32 seconds before the duo of Lokesh Sathyanathan and Swamynathan produced an Indian 1-2 in men’s long jump by clearing impressive distances of 7.87m and 7.77m respectively.
Another 1-2 result for the Indians came in the men’s discus throw through Kirpal Singh (57.88m) and Gagandeep Singh (53.57m).
Navjeet Kaur Dhillon fetched India’s fifth Gold of the day in women’s discus throw with a below-par 49.87m while Survi Biswas’ 47.47m effort was good enough to win a Silver in a mediocre field.
In women’s long jump, Sandra Babu won a Bronze to add to India’s medal tally with an effort of 6.02m.
In taekwondo also, India ruled the roost by clinching six medals, including three Golds.
Indian shuttlers also continued their dominating show with four individuals and as many doubles pairs cruising into the semifinals to assure themselves of medals.