Asian Games: Vithya Ramraj powers women’s relay team to gold

New Delhi: Relief and joy lit up the faces of India’s women quarter-milers as the relay team ended the country’s gold medal drought on the final day of athletics competition at the Nagoya City Mizuho Park Athletic Stadium on Tuesday.

Vithya Ramraj’s blistering anchor leg saw the Indian 4x400m relay team finish well ahead of Bahrain to win gold, clocking 3:29.69. Bahrain came in at 3:30.21s and China were third in 3:31.02. Vithya, who has had an outstanding Games and broke PT Usha’s 400m hurdles national record on Monday, powered through the bend after overtaking China’s anchor runner Siyu Zuo and was unstoppable on the home stretch. Bahrain’s Paris Olympics silver medallist Salwa Eid Naser chased down Zuo, but was unable to catch Vithya.

Kiran Pahal gave India a good start, and seasoned campaigner M Poovamma, 36, kept India in contention before handing over the baton to Prachi Chaudhary, who seemed to lose a few yards as China and Bahrain stayed in the hunt. Vithya, running the final leg, took the field by surprise with a strong finish. It was Vithya’s third medal in the Aichi-Nagoya Games.

The men’s 4x400m and mixed 4x100m relay teams finished with bronze medals. In mixed relay, Gurindervir Singh, SS Sneha, Animesh Kujur and Harita Bhadra finished third in 41.06secs, behind China (40.78secs) and Thailand (40.87secs). In the last race of the day, India’s men’s relay quarter-milers -- defending champions-- clocked 3:01.61, behind gold medallists Japan (3:00.75) and Qatar (3:00.93). The Indian team comprised Dharamveer Choudhary, T Manu, Jay Kumar and Vishal TK.

Earlier, distance runner Gulveer Singh finished on a high, completing a hat-trick of individual medals with a bronze medal in 5000m to go with silver medals in 10000m and 1500m.

Another gritty performance came from Pooja in the high jump, where she cleared 1.84m and took bronze. Pooja, who set the national record of 1.93m this season, missed all three attempts at 1.87m. Uzbekistan’s Sayfullaeva Barnokhon took gold with 1.90m, while Kazakhstan’s Kristina Ovchinnikova took silver with 1.87m. The 19-year-old Pooja is among the new talents to have emerged and has made steady progress. She won gold at the Asian Championships last year and silver at the Asian Indoor Championships.

India’s Dev Kumar Meena did well to set a national record in pole vault clearing 5.50m but finished seventh. Ernest John Obiena of the Philippines cleared a Games record 5.91m to win. There were no medals in the men’s (M Afsal) and women’s (Pooja) 800m, while Tanya Chaudhary (65.35m) and Anushka Yadav (64.56m) finished fourth and fifth respectively in the hammer throw.

Overall, India’s performance in track and field was below par. The big difference was the shortfall of five gold medals. India finished with 24 medals (1G-9S-14B), compared to 29 medals, including six gold, at the 2023 Hangzhou Games.

On the last day of the athletics campaign, the onus was on the women’s 4x400m relay team to provide the missing golden touch. India have dominated this event, winning five successive gold medals from 2002 to 2018 Games. They slipped to second in Hangzhou, beaten by Bahrain. Prachi and Vithya were part of that team. That loss was avenged on Tuesday.

“Everybody has been saying that there was no gold medal in athletics, so we were motivated to win the gold for the country. We are proud of the achievement,” Prachi told PTI in Nagoya. “I was part of the relay team when we got silver the last time. So, we badly wanted to win here,” she said.

When Vithya took charge, India were not in the lead. “I had to push more. I overtook one, and then two. Then came the finish line. Salwa is a 48-second runner. She has the capacity to do that. But my teammates gave me the distance and because of that I was able to maintain the gap,” Vithya said.

Poovamma, who was part of the gold medal winning Indian relay teams in 2014 and 2018, said she had a point to prove. It was her sixth medal at the Asian Games. She missed Hangzhou due to a doping suspension.

“I wanted to come back very badly. There were a lot of people who said whether Poovamma will be able to win a medal again,” she was quoted as saying by PTI.

“Many people asked when Poovamma will stop, whether some athlete can take my place. But why should I give up when I am performing well? Till I am performing, I will never give up. It’s only the hard work and motivation that matter.”