Manipur continues lead as rain mars National Games

Guwahati, Feb 14 (UNI) Unseasonal rain and icy winds marred some events as Manipur continued to lead the medals tally in the National Games here today.

Manipur has so far won 43 gold at the end of sixth day with Services and Delhi following the North Eastern state with their bulk of medals from water sports and swimming.

At the pool, despite bad weather and intermittent rain Delhi's Richa Mishra captured her ninth medal, including six gold.

She is, however, piped by Rehan Poncha in the overall medal tally as the Karnataka lad picked up so far nine medal including six gold, two silver and a bronze.

The heavy rains in fact forced the organisers to suspend all outdoor games like athletics and swimming midway and they are being rescheduled for tomorrow.

The MET office is predicting equally heavy rain tomorrow also, throwing the entire schedule haywire.

Rains also affected the performance of the athletes, leading to disappointment to a handful of spectators who braved continuous drizzle to watch track events.

Kerela and Tamil Nadu dominated the athletics events, picking up as many 29 medals between them though none of the national records were threatened, leave alone breaking them.

Kerala won seven gold while Tamil Nadu won five of the yellow metal.

For Kerala, Arunjith Nair won his second gold in the 200m, clocking 21.32 sec while Preeja Sreedharan pocketed two gold in the middle distance race.

UNI