Bright beginning for Karnataka

State swimmers dominate rain-hit day; mixed fortunes for water polo team

On a day when four other records were broken, Karnataka’s Group I boys’ made a clean sweep of four titles, while girls’ team in the corresponding category created a new national mark in the 4x100M freestyle relay.

With sun shinning bright, the quartet of Arhatha Magavi, Tulasi R Harsita, Sneha T and Pratima Kollali clocked four minutes 11.60 seconds for the gold, erasing the previous time of 4:15.51 which was also set by Karnataka in 2007.

But in the evening, heavy rains had the events being stopped at half-way stage for five minutes, but weather relented after that as races went ahead without further stoppage. Saurabh Sangvekar celebrated his maiden appearance for Karnataka in style, posting 1:55.42 seconds in the Group I boys’ 200M freestyle for the title.

Backstroke specialist Pranam B (100M backstroke, 1:02.03), breaststroker Akash Rohit (200M breaststroke, 1:09.91) and 4x100M freestyle relay team (3:44.87) completed the rout in the Group I boys’ category.

Akash prevailed in a thrilling race in which he led from the start and touched the 50-metre mark at 32.2, a narrow .3 seconds ahead of Neil Contractor of Gujarat. Akash and Neil went neck-to-neck in the next lap before the Karnataka lad squeezed past his opponent to touch the wall by a razor thin margin of .09 seconds.

Likith S P (Group II boys’ 200M breaststroke, 1:13.80) was the other gold medallist for the holders. Karnataka also won three silver and six bronze medals on Friday to stay ahead of Tamil Nadu (5 gold, 3 silver and 4 bronze). Delhi’s Priyanka Priyadarshni (Group I girls’ 100M breaststroke, 1:17.77), who twice broke the national record on Friday after she bettered the time in the morning heats, AV Jayaveena of Tamil Nadu (Group II girls’ 100M breaststroke, 1:19.02), Maharashtra’s Group II girls’ 4x100M freestyle relay team also rewrote national marks.

In waterpolo, Karnataka eves tounced Delhi 10-1 while their boys went down to Punjab 5-8.

Results: Boys: Group I: 200M freestyle: Saurabh Sangvekar (Kar) 1:55.42, 1; Jaywant Vijay Kumar (TN) 1:58.64, 2; Ajay A (Kar) 2:00.67, 3.
100M backstroke: Pranam B (Kar) 1:02.03,1; V Turbu (Ker) 1:02.66, 2; Sujay Shah (Guj) 1:03.50, 3.
200M breaststroke: Akash Rohit (Kar) 1:09.91, 1; Neil Contractor (Guj) 1:09.98, 2; Arun S (Ker) 1:11.25, 3.
4x100M freestyle relay: Karnataka (Akash Rohit, Prajwal K S, Ajay A, Saurabh Sangvekar) 3:44.87, 1; Gujarat (Rahul, Sujay, Raj, Neil) 3:46.95, 2; Tamil Nadu (Sandeep, Balaji, Larsen, Jaywant) 3:53.30, 3.
Group II: 200M freestyle: S K Adarsh Narayan (TN) 2:06.25, 1; Vedant Rao (Mah) 2:07.09, 2; Rohitash Dubey (MP) 2:07.48, 3.
100M backstroke: T Sethu Manickavel (TN) 1:05.31, 1; P Kumaresh Pandian (TN) 1:07.25, 2; Akash Debnath (WB) 1:07.65, 3.
200M breaststroke: Likith S P (Kar) 1:13.80, 1; Viraj Prabhu (Mah) 1:14.66, 2; Akshay Prasad (Mah) 1:15.61, 3.
4x100M freestyle relay: Tamil Nadu (Keerthan, Sriniram, Arnesh, Adarsh) 4:04.15, 1; Maharashtra (Saurabh M, Jason, Viraj, Vedant) 4:04.69, 2; Karnataka (Suhas Y, Pushpanand H, Sharath R, Md Yaqoob Saleem) 4:07.37, 3.
Girls: Group I: 200M freestyle: Anusha Mehta (TN) 2:11.24, 1; Pratima Kollali (Kar) 2:13.32, 2; Arhatha Magavi (Kar) 2:13.44, 3.
100M backstroke: Ananya Panigrahi (Mah) 1:09.03, 1. Equalled National Record (Fariha Zaman, Assam, 2006); Jyotsna Pansare (Mah) 1:09.04, 2; R Sushmitha (TN) 1:09.29, 3.
100M breaststroke: Priyanka Priyadarshni (Del) 1:17.77, 1. National record (Old: 1:19.50, Ambika S Iyenker, Karnataka, 2003); Bhoomi R Motwani (Kar) 1:19.91, 2; M Raghavi (TN) 1:19.94, 3. 4x100M freestyle: Karnataka (Arhatha Magavi, Tulasi R Harsita, Sneha T, Pratima Kollali) 4:11.60, 1. NR (Old: 4:15.51, Karnataka, 2007); Tamil Nadu (Sushmita, Meenakshi, Kavya, Anusha) 4:14.52. BMR; Maharashtra (Ananya, Shinjini, Kanchi, Jyotsna) 4:20.20,3.
Group II: 200M freestyle: Shivani Kataria (Har) 2:13.49, 1; Monique Gandhi (Mah) 2:15.08, 2; Malavika B (Kar) 2:15.39, 3.
100M backstroke: Avantika Chavan (Mah) 1:13.03,1; Rhea Castelino (AP) 1:14.89, 2; Sahithya Alva (Kar) 1:15.13, 3.
100M breaststroke: AV Jayaveena (TN) 1:19.02. NR (Old: 1:20.32, Delhi, 2010); Monique Gandhi (Mah) 1:20.42, 2; Charu Hamsini DA (Kar) 1:20.83, 3.
4x100M freestyle relay: Maharashtra (Monique, Akanksha B, Avantika, Akanksha V) 4:18.13, 1. NR (Old: 4:18.13, Maharashtra, 2010); Karnataka (Ashritha Bharadwaj, Siya Manjeshwar, Abhijna A, Malavika V) 4:18.45, 2. BMR; Tamil Nadu (Sherlyn, Sitara, Aarthi, Samyukta) 4:27.77, 3.
Waterpolo: Boys: Punjab: 8 (Guranjit Singh 5, Amitaj Verma 2, Karam Brar 1) bt Karnataka: 5 (Vishal Ajjampur 3, Prasidh P Kumar2); Maharashtra bt Manipur 11-0; Bengal bt Madhya Pradesh 15-0; Kerala bt Delhi 10-0.
Girls:
Karnataka: 10 (Uttara K 3, Ishwarya KM 5, Anarghya Prasad 1, Megha Sree 1) bt Delhi: 1.