Media365
Teenage Indian para swimmer Ravi Budigina won his third medal at the Asian Para Games 2026, claiming bronze in the men’s 50m freestyle S13 event in Nagoya on Thursday. Kapil Kumar and Swatik Patil also finished on the podium in their respective events, taking India’s medal tally in swimming to nine.The 18-year-old visually impaired swimmer from Andhra Pradesh clocked 25.89 seconds to finish third in the 50m freestyle. He had earlier won silver medals in the men’s S13 100m backstroke and 100m freestyle events.Kapil, 26, won silver in the men’s 400m freestyle S10 event with a time of 4:38.44 seconds. Japan’s Akito Minai took gold in a Games-record time of 4:27.44 seconds, while Iran’s Shahin Izadyar finished third in the five-swimmer field with a time of 4:38.65 seconds.Swatik, 24, added another medal for India by finishing third in the men’s 100m breaststroke SB9 event. He clocked one minute and 13.77 seconds, behind Iran’s Sina Zeyghaminejad, who won gold in 1:09.47, and Izadyar, who took silver in 1:13.23.The SB9 classification is for swimmers with minimal physical impairments, while S13 is for athletes with vision impairment who have the least vision loss among eligible competitors. Swimmers in the S10 category typically have minimal physical impairments, such as weakness affecting their legs, missing feet, a leg missing below the knee or problems with their hips.In Paralympic swimming, the prefixes S, SB and SM indicate the stroke category. S is used for freestyle, backstroke and butterfly, SB for breaststroke and SM for individual medley events.In athletics, India also swept all three medals in the men’s high jump T63 final, with Shailesh Kumar winning gold ahead of Varun Bhati and Rahul Saroha. The trio repeated India’s podium sweep from the 2022 edition in the men’s high jump T42/T63 event.Shailesh cleared 1.89m to set a new Asian Para Games record, breaking the previous mark of 1.80m set by India’s Sharad Kumar at the 2014 edition in Incheon, South Korea.Shailesh remained in close competition with Varun until the bar was raised to 1.84m. He then cleared 1.87m and 1.89m to secure gold and establish the new Games record.Former Paralympic bronze medallist Varun won silver with a season’s best of 1.84m, while Rahul took bronze after clearing 1.81m.
