Leading the medal rush was Rehan Poncha, who bagged his third individual and fifth overall gold medal in the event so far. He won the men's 400 metres freestyle event in a record time of four minutes 04.49 seconds beating his own record of 4:05.21 set at the World Championships in Melbourne this year. As has been the norm in all the races he has taken part in so far, it was a dominating performance from the 21-year-old.

In Friday's race, he had to fend off a slight challenge from team-mate Rohit R Havaldar in the initial stages. But Poncha was a determined swimmer. Lap after lap, he gained ground and won comfortably.

Kshipra Mahajan (400M freestyle), Tejasvini V (200M breaststroke) and Pooja R Alva (100M butterfly) clinched gold for Karnataka in the women's section.

For Tejasvini, the win did not come easily at all. She, team-mate Prerana S Jain and Andhra Pradesh's MS Divya broke off from the rest of the pack. As the three competed with each other, it could have gone anyone's way.
However, Tejasvini did well to surge ahead in the last 10 metres or so to pip her rivals to bag the top spot.

It was not very easy for Alva in the 100M butterfly event either. She was constantly challenged by Maharashtra's Lekha Kamat and Madhya Pradesh's Shubha C. Just like Tejasvini, it was that split second burst of power at the very end which settled the issue in Alva's favour.

Among other record-breakers on Friday were Delhi's Sandeep Sejwal and Police's Arjun Muralidharan in the men's 200M breaststroke and 100M butterfly events respectively.

Sejwal muscled his way past the rest of the field and won in 2:19.51. He had done a timing of 2:20.33 at the Asian Age Group swimming event in Jakarta in August.

The State men's 4x100M relay foursome of Sandeep NA, Rehan Poncha, Ashwin Menon and Aaron D'Souza rewrote the old Services record of 3:40.46, clocking 3:39.41.

The Karnataka women's water polo team registered a 4-2 win over Bengal.

Karnataka's Karishma M Mohite took bronze in the women's three metre springboard diving event. Railways' Hruthika Shriram and Taniya Ganguly won gold and silver respectively.

Results: Men: 400M freestyle: Rehan Poncha (Kar, 4:04.49 seconds) 1; Rohit Havaldar (Kar, 4:09.92) 2; Arun Kumar (Services, 4:15.29) 3. NR. Old record: 4:05.21 (Rehan Poncha, 2007). 100M butterfly: Arjun Muralidharan (Police, 56.19 seconds) 1; Akbar Ali Mir (Rlys, 58.81) 2; Siddhant Deshmukh (Kar, 58.93) 3. NR. Old record: 56.54 (Arjun Muralidharan, Police, 2006). 200M breaststroke: Sandeep Sejwal (Del, 2:19.51 seconds) 1; S P Lenka (Services, 2:31.63) 2; V Abhishek (Kar, 2: 33.92) 3. NR. Old record: 2:20.33 (Sandeep Sejwal, 2007). 4x100M freestyle relay: Karnataka (3:39.41 min) 1; Railway (3:42.86) 2; Services (3:43.65) 3. NR. Old record: 3:40.46 (Services, 2003). Women: 400M freestyle: Kshipra Mahajan (Kar, 4:40.40 min) 1; Pooja R Alva (Kar, 4:42.10) 2; Aarti Ghorpade (Mah, 4:44.61) 3.  100M butterfly: Pooja R Alva (Kar, 1:05.86) 1; Lekha Kamath (Mah, 1:06.06) 2; Shubha C (MP, 1:06.66) 3. 200M breaststroke: Tejasvini V (Kar, 2:50.62 min) 1; Prerana S Jain (Kar, 2:52.92) 2; MS Divya (AP, 2:54.03) 3. 4x100M freestyle relay: Karnataka (4:11.94) 1; Maharashtra (4:25.53) 2; Kerala (4:26.98) 3.

Diving: 3M springboard: Men: M Manish Kumar (Services, 272.50) 1; Harish Annal Das (Rlys, 228.05) 2; Vijay K Bhaidya (Mah, 222.40) 3. Women: Hrutika Shriram (Rlys, 197.25) 1; Tania Ganguly (Rlys, 185.95) 2; Karishma M Mohite (Kar, 176.30) 3.

Water polo: Men: Bengal bt Maharashtra 6-2; Police drew with Kerala 8-8; Services bt Manipur 7-1. Women: Karnataka bt Bengal 4-2; Maharashtra bt Manipur 11-0; Police bt Delhi 10-1; Police bt Maharashtra 7-4.