India’s Tejaswin Shankar won the bronze medal in the men’s decathlon at the Asian Games in Aichi-Nagoya on Sunday, finishing with 7,934 points after a strong all-round performance.
Japan’s Yuma Maruyama claimed the gold with 8,123 points, while China’s Chen Xinghua took silver with 8,012 points.
Shankar came close to retaining the silver medal he won at the previous Asian Games but finished third this time. His 7,934-point tally was also an improvement on his previous Asian Games performance.
The Indian athlete had crossed the 8,000-point mark earlier this year and came close to reaching that milestone again in Aichi-Nagoya.
India also added a silver medal in the women’s long jump, with Ancy Sojan finishing second with a best effort of 6.53m.
Sojan missed gold by just two centimetres, with China’s Huang Yingying winning the event with 6.55m. Another Chinese athlete, Tan Mengyi, took bronze with 6.46m, while India’s Shaili Singh finished fourth with 6.42m.
In the men’s 800m, India’s Mohammed Afsal qualified for the final after finishing third in his heat in 1:47.37.
Afsal was just 0.01 seconds behind Qatar’s Hatim Aitoulghazi, who clocked 1:47.36, while Iran’s Ali Amirian won the heat in 1:47.26. Afsal advanced as one of the two fastest runners outside the automatic qualification spots.
India’s Krishan Kumar, however, missed out on the 800m final after finishing third in Heat 3 with a time of 1:50.38.
China’s Xi Xiaoheng won the heat in 1:49.82, followed by Japan’s Nanaki Manno in 1:49.91, with both securing automatic qualification.
The top two runners from each heat and the next two fastest athletes advanced to the final.
