Super Srihari leads Karnataka's charge on day 3

Srihari Nataraj continued his fine form this season to lead the charge as Karnataka stamped their authority on the 71st Senior National Aquatic Championships on Monday.

Banking on his nippy strokes and quality kicking, the 16-year-old backstroker set a new national record in 200M backstroke.

Competing in a strong field comprising of Aravind Mani of the Services and local boy Advait Page, Srihari needed a good start to have a chance of winning the race. Though the Global Swim Centre trainee was slow to get off the blocks, he did enough to stay with the leading pack till the 100-metre mark. Later, he shifted gears and slowly pushed ahead to win the race in 2:03.89. The timing helped him better his own national mark of 2:04.11 set at the Junior Nationals early this year.

Incidentally, Srihari has also qualified for the Youth Olympics to be held next year in Argentina in this event. He had clocked 2:05.20 for a silver medal at the 9th Asian Age-group Aquatic Championships in Tashkent, Uzbekistan last month. The ‘A’ qualifying standard for the Youth Games is set at 2:05.50.

His win also meant that Karnataka built a strong hold at the top of the medals table with six gold, seven silver and five bronze medals. Kerala, thanks to their only medal winner Sajan Prakash, are placed second with four gold medals. Railways, meanwhile, are third with three gold, five silver and three bronze medals. The day, that witnessed a handful of close races, also saw two meet records being set. Taking to the pool for the 100M butterfly, Sajan stopped the clock at 53.83 seconds, improving on his previous meet record set at 54.43 seconds last year in Ranchi.

Later, the Railways quartet of Aaron D’Souza, Avantika Chavan, Viraj Prabhu and Aditi Dhumatkar dominated the 4x50M freestyle mixed relay. The Railways contingent won the race in 1:41.54, another meet record. They obliterated the previous best of 1:42.39 set by Maharashtra in 2015.

For Karnataka, Malavika V continued her dominance over long distance swimming by winning the 1500M freestyle in 17:59.08. Bhavika Dugar was second in 18:08.00 while the upcoming Karnataka swimmer Khushi Dinesh was third in 18:24.3.

Another State swimmer, Suvana Baskar was also among medallists, clinching a silver in the 200M backstroke in 2:28.14, while the State team of Khushi, Damini Gowda, Mayuri Lingaraj and Malavika won the 4x200M freestyle relay in 9:13.11.

DH News Service

Results: 400M freestyle: Sajan Prakash (Kerala) 3:58.53, 1; Saurabh Sangvekar (Railways) 4:00.31, 2; Kushagra Rawat (Delhi) 4:03.53, 3.

200M backstroke: Srihari Nataraj (Karnataka) 2:03.89, (NR; Old: 2:04.11, Srihari Nataraj, Karnataka, 2017) 1; T Sethumanickavel (Tamil Nadu) 2:07.34, 2; Advait Page (Madhya Pradesh) 2:07.65, 3.

100M butterfly: Sajan Prakash (Kerala) 53.83, 1; Supriyo Mondal (Railways) 55.33, 2; Avinash Mani (Karnataka) 55.68, 3.

Women: 50M freestyle: AV Jayaveena (Tamil Nadu) 27.35, 1; Aditi Dhumatkar (Railways) 27.37, 2; Avantika Chavan (Railways) 27.40, 3.

1500M freestyle: Malavika V (Karnataka) 17:58.08, 1; Bhavika Dugar (Tmail Nadu) 18:08.00, 2; Khushi Dinesh (Karnataka) 18:24.35, 3.

200M backstroke: Soubrity Mondal (Bengal) 2:27.33, 1; Suvana Baskar (Karnataka) 2:28.14, 2; Yuga Birnale (Maharashtra) 2:31.24, 3.

100M butterfly: Shivani Kataria (Haryana) 1:04.37, 1; Divya Satija (Haryana) 1:04.45, 2; Trisha Karkhanis (Maharashtra) 1:04.83, 3.

4x200M freestyle relay: Karnataka 9:13.11, 1; Tamil Nadu 9:20.12, 2; Maharashtra 9:26.04, 3.

4x50M mixed freestyle relay: Railways 1:41.54 (NMR; Old: 1:42.39, Maharashtra, 2015) 1; Karnataka 1:43.71, 2; Maharashtra 1:44.42, 3.

Diving: Platform: Men: Puskar Meitei (Services) 346.09, 1; Tushar Giyate (Railways) 312.30, 2; Siddharth Pardeshi (Services) 255, 3. Women: Deepti Panwar (Railways) 214.35, 1; Hrutika Shriram (Railways) 199.90, 2; Moupriya Mitra (Bengal) 177.45, 3. Waterpolo: Men: Railways: 11 bt Madhya Pradesh: 0; Services: 4 bt Maharashtra: 3; Kerala: 12 bt Delhi: 1; Police: 9 bt Karnataka: 2; Bengal: 6 bt Manipur: 1. Women: Kerala: 4 bt Karnataka: 3; Maharashtra: 6 drew with Bengal: 6.