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History made as Swapna Barman becomes first Indian to win Asian Games gold in heptathlon

Asian Games 2018: Swapna Barman created history by becoming the first Indian heptathlete to win an Asian Games gold

By Pti
Swapna Barman, Indian heptathlon

Jakarta, August 29: Swapna Barman created history by becoming the first Indian heptathlete to win an Asian Games gold here, a feat he achieved despite competing with pain due to a toothache.

Asian Games 2018: Have achieved my dreams, says gold winner Swapna Barman
Swapna Barman

The 21-year-old Barman logged 6026 points from the seven events competed for two days. En route the title, she won the high jump (1003 points) and javelin throw (872 points) events and finished second-best in shot put (707 points) and long jump (865 points). Her weakest events were 100m (981 points, 5th position) and 200m in which she finished seventh with 790 points.

Asian Games special page | Medals tally | Born with 6 toes

Going into the 800m run, the last of the seven-event competition, Barman was leading China's Qingling Wang by 64 points. She needed a good run in the concluding event, in which she eventually finished fourth. It was the same event after which she had collapsed during the Asian Athletics Championship last year in Bhubaneswar but despite finishing fourth on Wednesday (August 29), she emerged a champion.

Another Indian in the fray, Purnima Hembram was 18 points behind Japan's Yuki Yamasaki, going into the 800m run, but she finished just ahead of Barman and overall fourth with 5837 points. Qingling (5954) won the silver and Yamasaki the bronze medal with 5873 points.

Before Barman, only Bengal's Soma Biswas and Karnataka's JJ Shobha and Pramila Aiyappa had returned with a medal from the Asian Games. Biswas and Shobha had finished two-three at both Busan Asian Games (2002) and the Doha Games (2006), while Pramila had won a bronze at the Guangzhou edition.

Story first published: Friday, August 31, 2018, 12:39 [IST]
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