Dubai
Jeremy Lalrinnunga clinched India’s first ever gold medal at the 3rd Youth Olympic Games at Buenos Aires on Sunday. The 15-year-old, who hails from Aizawl, won gold with his career-best total of 274kg in men’s weightlifting 62kg category.
In the two editions prior to this, India’s best performance was two medals in the 2014 Youth Olympics at Nanjing, China.
Jeremy recorded successful attempts of 120 kg and 124 kg in snatch and 142kg and 150kg in clean & jerk, respectively. Toptas Caner of Turkey won the silver medal with a total of 263 kg and Estiven Jose Manjarres of Colombia won the bronze medal with 260 kg.
Earlier this year in April, Lalrinnunga had broken two national records to win a silver in the youth and a bronze in junior at the Asian Youth and Junior Weightlifting Championship at Urgench, Uzbekistan.
Mehuli Ghosh, a Commonwealth Games silver medallist shooter, had to settle for the silver medal in women’s 10m air rifle. A 9.1 in her final shot forced her to finish with 248.0 behind Denmark’s Stephanie Grundsoee, who managed 248.7. Tushar Mane claimed a silver in the 10m Air Rifle while Tababi Devi bagged silver in the 44kg Judo.
India also thrashed Austria 9-2 in hockey. In badminton, Lakshya Sen had to sweat it out against Danylo Bosniuk in the first game before beating the Ukrainian 23-21, 21-8.
Meanwhile, UAE’s Latifa Al Mazami finished 19th in Rifle 10m shooting event. She scored 606 points in six rounds from where eight shooters qualified for the medal round.
UAE’s Omar Abdul Aziz Al Marzouqi competed in the first round of the Team Show Jumping, which consists of New Zealand, Australia and Iran.
Talal Al Shenqeeti, Acting Secretary General of the National Olympic Committee, visited the UAE contingent at the Olympic Village in Buenos Aires to ensure that all the technical and logistical needs of the athletes are well looked after.
