Tejaswin Shankar wins gold in Asian Indoor Athletics heptathlon
Tejaswin Shankar won gold in men’s heptathlon at the Asian Indoor Athletics Championships in Tianjin, setting a new national indoor record with 5993 points. India finished sixth overall with five medals, including silvers for Pooja and Tajinderpal Singh Toor
Tianjin (China): Tejaswin Shankar won the men’s heptathlon event to clinch India’s lone gold as the country ended its Asian Indoor Athletics Championships campaign with five medals here on Sunday.
India finished overall sixth in the medals tally. China topped the chart with 34 medals — 10 gold, 11 silver and 13 bronze.
On his way to winning the gold medal in heptathlon, Shankar collected 5993 points to better his own national indoor mark of 5650 points set in 2021 in the USA.
Pooja (silver in high jump), Tajinderpal Singh Toor (silver in shot put) and Ancy Sojan (bronze in long jump) were other medal winners on Sunday.
On the opening day on Friday, India’s high jumper Aadrash Ram Jothi Shankar had won a bronze.
Shankar, who was leading on Day 1, continued his good form in the next three events — 60m hurdles, pole vault and 1000m — on Sunday.
In the 60m hurdles, Shankar clocked 8.02 seconds to earn 977 points. With two events to go, the Indian athlete was nearly 485 points ahead of his nearest rival.
Shankar was fourth in pole vault with a height of 4.20m. He earned 673 points to increase his tally to 5163 points. In 1000m, the last event of the day, Shankar finished second with a time of 2:43.91 (830 points) to increase his total to 5993 points.
Shankar also holds the national decathlon (outdoor) record of 7826 points set last year in Poland. He also won silver in decathlon at the 2023 Asian Games held in China.
In the men’s shot put, Tajinderpal Singh Toor claimed a silver with a season-best throw of 20.05m.
Toor’s other legal throws were 19.49m and 19.85m. His last two attempts were no marks. China’s Chengyu Chen took the gold with a throw of 20.07m.
