Rowers pick two more bronze medals in Coxless Four, Men's Quadruple

Hangzhou, Sep 25 (IANS) India bagged two bronze medals in the Asian Games rowing competitions here on Monday to finish with a total of 5 medals -- two silver and three bronze medals.

On Monday, the Indian Coxless Four of Jaswinder Singh, Bheem Singh, Punit Kumar and Ashish clocked 6:10.81 to finish third behind Uzbekistan and China. The Indian boat was going strong in the second spot before the Chinese came from behind to overtake them and grab the silver medal.

The Indians reached the 500m mark in 1:30,98 and were in fourth position. They moved up to the third position by the 1500m as the Chinese got into the second position. That's how they crossed the finish line in the 2000m course with Uzbekistan first and China second.

The second bronze at the Fuyang Water Sports Centre on Monday came in the Men's Quadruple Sculls with the Indian boat powered by Satnam Singh, Parminder Singh, Jakar Khan and Sukhmeet Singh finishing third in a timing of 6:06.61. China took gold with a timing of 6:02.65 while Uzbekistan bagged silver in 6:04.64.

India was the defending champion in this discipline, having won the gold medal in the 2018 Asian Games in Jakarta. Sukhmeet Singh is the only rower who was part of the 2018 team rowing here on Monday as were the other three members Dattu Bhoknal. Om Prakash and Sawarn Singh are no longer part of the team.

Timing-wise it was a big improvement on that team as India clocked 6:06.61 on Monday while in 2018, they won gold in 6:17.13. There was no Chinese team in contention in Indonesia.

India thus ended the rowing competitions at the 19th Asian Games in Hangzhou with five medals. They had bagged three medals on the penultimate day on Sunday -- two silver and one bronze.

The silver medals came in the Men's Lightweight Double Sculls and Men's Coxed Eight while the Men's Coxless Four, Coxless Pair and Quadruple Sculls bagged the three bronze medals.

Though not adding a gold to the two India have won in Asian Games rowing competitions was a bit disappointing, the Indians still did well as they had reached nine finals in all, bagging medals in five of them.