Indian rowers grab one, miss one Bronze in Doha

Doha, Dec 6 (UNI) Indian rowing duo of Kiran Yalamanchi and Bijender Singh showed tremendous grit as they edged out their rivals from Kazakhstan to bag the Bronze medal in Men's Lightweight Double Sculls event of the Asian Games here today.

Japanese duo of Takahiro Suda and Hideki Omoto walked away with the Gold with a timing of 3:19.29s, while the Thai pair of Ruthanaphol Theppiubal and Anupong Thain finished with the Silver at 3:19.92s. The Indian duo timed 3:26.01 to win the Bronze, pipping Kazakh rowers Ivan Kharitonov and Artyom Issupov (3:30.88).

It was a neck-and-neck battle for the Bronze between the Indian and Kazakh pairs. The Kiran-Bijender pair took 1:38.54s for the first 500m but breathing down their neck were the Kazakhs who timed 1:38.99.

The Indians, however, kept pushing hard in the final 500m and that made all the difference as Kiran and Bijender timed 1:47.47s, ahead of their rivals who needed 1:51.89s for the second half of the race.

The Indian pair of Anil Kumar Mehrolia and Bajranglal Takhar, however, missed the Bronze by a whisker in men's double sculls event, where they finished fourth.

Uzbek rowers Vladmir Chrenenko and Ruslan Naurzaliyev won the Gold, clocking 3:16.74s, while South Koreans Ho Dal Kim and Wook Jung Ham pocketed the Silver at 3:20.01s.

Chinese pair of Hui Su and Yonghui Cui timed 3:22.47s to frustrate the Indians who timed 3:25.90s to finish outside the medal bracket.

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