Abeysinghe wins back to back golds

Cyclists take two gold medals

by Dinesh Weerawansa

SA GAMES: Hosts Sri Lanka bagged three more gold medals - two in cycling and one in swimming on day four of the 10th South Asian Games yesterday.

Contributing towards Sri Lanka's gold haul at Monday's events of the eight-nation Games were 15-year-old swimming sensation Andrew Abeysinghe and the men's and women's cycling teams.

But the mighty Indians continued their dominance to increase their gold medal tally to 37 to make sure they remain on top with a convincing lead. Lekha Kamath accounted for two gold medals in last evening's events.

The US-based schoolboy, Andrew Abeysinghe won his back to back gold medal to spoil an Indian whitewash. Following his record breaking swim take men's 200m back stroke gold medal, the Lankan prodigy won his second gold of the Games.

The little Lankan had an another outstanding performance to win men's 100m back stroke gold as well, that too with a new SA Games record timing of one minute and 0.11 seconds. He erased the previous Games mark of 1:01.26 held by Indian Banu Sachdeva since 1995 and also bettered the Sri Lanka national mark of 1:02.68 held by Heshan Unamboowe.

It was fascinating to watch Abeysinghe, who showed a lot of promise and courage. True that he did not get the best of the starts compared to his standards, but he caught up fast and recovered well to win at the end.

Asked about the challenge he had to face in the first length, Abeysinghe said he was confident of making a come back even at that stage.

"I knew I could catch that up in the final length, in which I am normally strong. All what In wanted is to give another gold medal for my country.

I am happy that I could make it and prove the worth of my presence in the Sri Lanka team," a jubilant Abeysinghe said.

Indians Arjun Muralidharan and Sandeep Nagar were slightly ahead of Abeysinghe as the swimmers approached the halfway mark. It was then that young Abeysinghe fired all his cylinders to take the lead. Muralidharan (1:00.50) and Nagar (1:00.76) had to be satisfied with the silver and bronze medals respectively.

His swim was a blend of talent and techniques he has mastered in the US. Abeysinghe kept his arms parallel to the body with a sound techniques as he swam, thereby minimised the resistance from water.

Abeysinghe gave a fine answer to his critics who were made eat the humble pie at the end. If the national selectors would have included him for couple of more events, in which he requested to compete, he would have come closer to Julian Bolling's record gold haul in 1991.

Like on the previous day, Abeysinghe's feat was the only golden achievement for the hosts in Monday's swimming events. Similar to the first two days of the swimming competition, the Indians won six out of seven finals to increase their gold tally to 18 from swimming alone.

Sri Lanka won the other three events out of a total of 21 finals that have been worked off so far. The gold medallists for India in yesterday's events were Lekha Kamath (1:04.51 - NGR in women's 100m butterfly and 1:00.76 in 100m free style), Arjun Muralidharan (56.67 seconds in men's 100m butterfly), Fariha Zaman (1.70 seconds in women's 50m back stroke) and Tejaswan Vardharaju (5:16.21 - NGR, in women's 400m individual medley). The Indian men's relay team in 400m free style, comprising Muralidharan, Rohit Havaldar, Nagar and Virdhaval Khada, won the gold medal in three minutes and 37.41 seconds, ahead of Bangladesh (3:44.64) and Sri Lanka (3:45.43).

The bronze medal winning Sri Lanka team comprised Unamboowe, Chethiya Wijeratne, Milan De Silva and Daniel Lee. Sri Lanka's Mayumi Raheem won her fourth successive medal inside three days.

The golden girl on day one who bagged a silver on the following day, returned a timing of 1:02.85 to take the bronze medal in women's 100m free style and then clocked 5:26.21 to finish third in women's 400m individual medley - both new Sri Lanka national records.

Also contributing towards Sri Lanka's medal tally in swimming was Miniruwani Samarakoon, who clocked 1:11.85 to finish behind Indian Kamath in women's 100m butterfly event.