Wind blows away Dushyant’s golden chance as rower settles at No 3
Dushyant Chauhan was a kabaddi player when he had gone to Roorkee in 2012 for Army training and he had never heard about rowing. It was during a training session when rowing coach Sunny Singh noticed him. His 6 feet 1inch frame and strong body made him a good prospect for the sport. Sunny immediately approached and convinced him to take up the sport.
Fast forward to Wednesday, the kabaddi player-turned-rower Dushyant made a terrific Asian Games debut to win a bronze medal in the men’s lightweight single sculls at the Chungju Tangeum lake Rowing Center here.
The 21-year-old from Haryana was, in fact, in contention for the gold but missed it in the last few meters. Dushyant, who had scaled down his weight from 78 to 72 kg to compete in the lightweight event, took lead right after the 500m mark and maintained it till the last 200m in the 2000m race.
He probably exhausted himself by pushing too hard against the strong northerly winds on a rainy day. As the last quarter started, Hong Kong’s Kwan Hoi lok passed Dushyant to take the lead. And when the finishing line was just 100m away, and South Korea’s Hakbeom lee too passed him to push Dushyant to third place. He clocked 1 minute, 59.02 seconds, only 0.62 seconds behind the second placed lee.
“I was confident of the gold but my lane was the most affected by the strong wind. However, I am happy to win the bronze medal. The weather was very cold tody. I felt it very hard to race in this condition,” Dushyant said after winning the medal.
It was the first medal of the day after a fruitless stint at the shooting range for India and the 10th bronze in the Games.
“I am feeling very good because it is my first Asian Games medal. I can do better next time. I want to take gold,” he told.
India’s single sculler Bajrang lal Takhar created history by winning the first-ever rowing gold in the Guangzhou Games four years ago after his silver in Doha in 2006. And now Dushyant has continued the tradition of winning medals in the sport.
Earlier in the day, Roopendra Singh and Manjeet Singh finished fourth in the men’s lightweight double sculls final. Japan, Hong Kong and China won gold, silver and bronze respectively.
In the women’s pair final, Sanjukta Dung Dung and Tarunikha Pratap finished fifth in 8:28.13 minutes. The gold went to China, while Korea and Kazakhstan won silver and bronze respectively.