Nagoya: It was the penultimate event of the seven-day Athletics programme at the Aichi-Nagoya Asian Games 2026, and India still had not won a gold despite one-and-a-half dozen medals in track and field.
The women’s 4x400m relay team saved India the blushes by striking gold on another rainy night at Japan’s Nagoya.
The Indian quartet of Kiran Pahal, Poovamma Machettira, Prachi and Vithya Ramraj produced a brilliant team performance to top the race in a season-best timing of 3 minutes 29.69 seconds.
Vithya ran a scintillating anchor leg to leave her Bahraini (silver) and Chinese (bronze) opponents well behind.
Vithya thus emulated Gulveer Singh’s feat of earning three medals at the Aichi-Nagoya Games, having earlier claimed silver in 4×400 Mixed Relay and bronze in Women’s 400m Hurdles.
Gulveer on Tuesday added a bronze in Men’s 5,000m to his two silver medals earned in Men’s 10,000m and 1,500m earlier.
The Men’s 4×400 Relay team failed to match the women’s performance, being satisfied with bronze in the final event. The Indian quartet of Dharmveer Choudhary, Manu Thekkinalil, Jay Kumar and Vishal Thennarasu clocked 3:01.61 to finish third behind Qatar (gold) and Japan (silver).
Pooja ensured podium finish in Women’s High Jump with a bronze-clinching effort of 1.84 metres, well below her personal best. The 4x100m Mixed Relay team — comprising Gurindervir Singh, Sneha, Animesh Kujur and Harita Bhadra – also won a bronze.
At the end of Day 11, India jumped two places to be 12th in the medal standings. They crossed 50-medal mark and currently have 6 gold, 21 silver and 26 bronze.
India should climb the ladder as a number of gold medals can be expected in the remaining days.
Two boxers – Parveen Hooda and Ankush Panghal – advanced to the finals on Tuesday. The hockey teams are looking good to be champions, and men’s cricket should also clinch gold even as rain continues to wash out matches.