Shubhankar 11th as Kapil, Akshay in joint lead
NUH, HARYANA: India’s top golfer Shubhankar Sharma, returning on the PGTI after a gap of more than a year, carded a two-under-70 to be placed 11th even as Delhi’s Kapil Kumar and Chandigarh’s Akshay Sharma shot five-under-67 to be in joint lead on the opening day of the PGTI Players Championship at the Classic Golf and Country Club on Tuesday.
Two more Delhi golfers, Himmat Singh Rai and Naman Dawar, and Kolkata’s Sunit Chowrasia were tied for third at four-under-68.
Twenty-six-year old Kapil, who last year had finished 18th on the PGTI Order of Merit, made the turn at two-under after coming close making birdies on a few holes.
Kapil recovered after a bogey on the 12th as he sank eagle-birdie-birdie on the 14th, 15th and 16th. He finally ended Day 1 on 67 after a bogey and a birdie.
MIRABAI AIMS TO BREAK WORLD RECORD
NEWDELHI: She made a successful comeback after an injury lay-off, but India’s top weightlifter Mira- bai Chanu realises that she needs to improve her performance by a few notches if she wants to claim gold at the Tokyo Olympics.
“With the increase of 1kg from 48 to 49, all the weightlifters will now try to increase their total lift. Moreover, some lifters, who were competing in 53kg earlier will now come down to 49kg. So, the competition will be tougher now,” Mirabai told PTI in an interview.
A TEAM BEATS FRANCE 2-0 IN WOMEN’S HOCKEY
LUCKNOW: The India ‘A’ women’s hockey team defeated France ‘A’ 2-0 in the third match to take a 2-1 lead in the four-match series at the Padma Shri Mohammad Shahid Synthetic Hockey Stadium here on Tuesday.
Local girl Mumtaz Khan (42nd minute) and Sharmila Devi (60th) scored for the home team.
ODISHA BEAT COORG 3-0 IN HOCKEY NATIONAL
HISAR, HARYANA: Odisha defeated Coorg 3-0 in their last Pool A match to stay in contention for a place in the quarterfinals of the ninth Hockey Senior Women National Championship (Divi- sion A) here on Tuesday.
Odisha ended their pool engagements with six points from four games, while winless Coorg remained at the bottom of the table.
BOOK ON PRO-KABADDI LEAGUE LAUNCHED
NEWDELHI: The growing popularity of kabaddi in India and how it is changing lives of sportspersons who once lived in the shadows of cricket superstars has been well captured in Vivek Chaudhary’s book—kabaddi by Nature.
Vivek is a senior sports journalist, having reported extensively for the Guardian (UK). This book on kabaddi is his first endeavour. Encouraged by kabaddi’s role in India’s freedom struggle, the 10 chapters of Vivek’s book is a commentary on how the Pro Kabaddi League has galvanised the sport, not only by winning millions of eyeballs on TV but fetching lucrative sums (over a crore) for half-a-dozen stars of the sport.