*J&K’s Shahid Ahmad Chichi, Mehraj Ud Din Bhat win silver & bronze in Men’s Sprints Mountaineering Skiing; Shazia clinches silver in Women category
Excelsior Sports Correspondent
GULMARG, Feb 22: On the second day of fourth edition of Khelo India Winter Games, players took to venues to participate in the Nordic Skiing, Alpine Skiing, Ski Mountaineering and Snowboarding events here today.
India’s leading alpine skier Aanchal Thakur clinched the giant slalom gold as Himachal Pradesh women made a clean sweep of the medals in the event. Aanchal, the 27-year-old from Himachal Pradesh, won with a time of 00:56.339 seconds, followed by state-mates Tunaja Thakur and Promila Thakur who won silver and bronze, respectively.
Karnataka continued to lead the medals tally at the Koongdoori course with eight gold medals, while Army climbed to third and Uttarakhand struck their first pair of gold medals at the games.
The comprehensive measures taken by the J&K Sports Council ensured that all the events were successfully conducted with all the logistics available to the players.
In the early morning, the field of event for Nordic Sprint witnessed the brimming Gulmarg bowl with snow sports enthusiasts. At the Golf Club, Nordic Sprint for Men of distance 1.6 KM was held in which 36 players participated where Army again made a clean sweep as Manjeet bagged Gold Medal while Padma Namgial got Silver and Rameez Ahmad Padder settled for Bronze.
Manjeet, representing the Army, won the Silver Medal yesterday. Speaking at the medal presentation ceremony, he expressed excitement over the achievements and gave credit to his family, friends and staff who encouraged him and chiseled his potential.
In the same event for women’s category of distance 5KM, Bhavani Thekeda Nanjunda from Karnataka bagged Gold; Sapna and Prince Kumari representing ITBP received Silver and bronze respectively.
The highlights of the Khelo India Winter Games for the second day were the events held at Kongdoori where three sports events of Giant Slalom, Run Slalom and Mountaineering Sprints for Men and Women groups were organised as per the fixtures.
In the Sprints Mountaineering Skiing, Menka Gunjiyal from Uttarakhand bagged the Gold medal; Shazia Hassan from J&K got the Silver while Kaamya Kathikeyan from Maharashtra got the bronze medal.
Menka Gunjiyal from Uttarakhand could not hold herself as she jumped in joy when she was declared winner. She acknowledged that the competition was very good from other participants but she put her best to win the Gold Medal. Her father who had been also an athlete and is Padma Shri awardee is her role model. She desires to gain more experience and represent country in the Olympic games.
Mountaineering Skiing for Men’s category was flagged-off by Olympian Shiva Keshavan at Kangdoori. The Sprint race culminated with Mayank Dimiri from Uttarakhand taking the Gold Medal while Shahid Ahmad Chichi and Mehraj Ud Din Bhat from J&K winning silver and bronze respectively.
So, it has been a golden day for Uttarakhand as another player from the state won the Gold medal in Mountaineering Skiing at Kangdoori. Mayank while displaying his happiness said that he is proud of his performance and divulged that he has trained consistently. Talking about the difference between the slopes of Gulmarg and Uttarakhand he said that the vertical slopes here are ideal for skiing and these slopes show the perfect gradient of snow sports.
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