Maharastra retains overall swimming championship

Margao, Jun 24 (UNI) Maharastra swimmers displayed their best by bagging 38 medals, including 15 gold to retain the overall swimming championship with 355 points in the 24th sub-junior National Aquatic Championship, that concluded here at Sports Authority Swimming Pool in South Goa.

Karantaka, on the other hand, had to be content with the second place with 271 points. They claimed 26 medals that included 11 gold.

Maharastra's Yudhishitar Jaising, Karantaka's Pratima Kollali in group III and S Prajwal(Karnataka) and Sagar Kumar (Assam) in group IV were adudged as individual champions for their best perofrmance in the swimming championship.

The last of the four-day swimming championship saw three new meet records being set, one each by Maharastra, Karantaka and Uttar Pradesh taking the tally of rewritten records to 11 in the swimming championship.

Out of the 8 events of the day, Maharastra bagged 5 gold with one new meet record by Kavya Bhandekar in 100 mts back stroke girls group III with a new timing of 01:14:88 eclipsing the previous record in the name of her own teammate Surbhi Tipre 01:14:89 established in 2005.

The other gold medalist from Maharashtra was Sudhanshu Sharma in 50 mt backstroke boys group IV with a timing of 00:36:78. Others were Yudhishthir Jaising in 100 mts freestyle boys group III with a timing of 01:03:19, Karan Jaisingh in 100 mts freestyle boys group IV with a timing of 01:09;13 and Pranjali Davda in 100 mts freestyle girls group IV with a timing of 01:11:38.

Karnataka's Pratima Kollali set a new meet record in the 100 mt freestyle girls group III with a new timing of 01:04:99. She erased the previous record in the name of Maharastra's Surbhi Tipre whose timing was 01:06:17 established in 2005. Karantaka's second gold today was claimed by Prajwala S in 50 mts backstroke girls group IV with a timing of 00:40:45.

Sony Yadav of Uttar Pradesh also set a new meet record in 100 mts backstroke boys group III with a new timing of 01:12: 09. He broke the existing record in the name of Sagar Patil of Maharastra 01:12:61 set in 2003.

Goa Chief Minister Digamber Kamat, who was the chief guest at the function gave away the prizes to the winners.

UNI