Sajan clinches gold, Vedaant bags silver

Copenhagen: Ace Indian swimmer Sajan Prakash clinched the gold medal in the men's 200m butterfly event at the Danish Open 2022, here.

Competing for the first time in an international meet this year, Sajan clocked 1.59.27 seconds to finish on the top of the podium. Denmark's Heorhij Lukashev followed in 1:59.89 and Oliver Sogaard-Andersen (2:02.81) came third on Friday night.

The 28-year-old Prakash clocked the national record timing of 1:56:38 in the 200m butterfly, last year, to become the first Indian swimmer to qualify for the Olympics directly by breaching 'A' standard time. He also became the first and only Indian swimmer to make it to two Olympic Games.

At the last Asian Games in 2018, the Kerala swimmer finished fifth in the 200m butterfly event after becoming the first Indian swimmer since 1986 to qualify for the finals.

Meanwhile, in the men's 1500m freestyle event, 16-year-old Vedaant Madhavan, son of Indian actor R Madhavan, achieved his personal best time of 15.57.86 to clinch the silver medal in the 10-swimmer final.

Vedaant was beaten to the finish line by Alexander Bjorn (15:50.18). Frederik Lindholm (16:02.22) clinched the bronze, an olympics.com report said.

The teenager's actor father was elated with his son's silver medal win in Copenhagen. Sharing a video clip from the felicitation ceremony on his Instagram handle, the 51-year-old actor thanked his son's coach Pradeep Kumar and the Swimming Federation of India for their support.

"@vedaantmadhavan wins Silver for India at the Danish Open in Copenhagen. Thank you so much Pradeep sir, #swimmingfederationofindia, and #ansadxb for all your efforts. We are so proud," Madhavan wrote in the caption of the video.

The 16-year-old Vedant is coming into the new season on the back of a fantastic 2021, which saw him win the bronze medal at the Latvian Open and seven medals -- four silver and three bronze -- at the Junior National Aquatic Championships.

On the other hand, Shakthi Balakrishnan, with the timing of 5:10:71 in the women's 400m individual medley, finished eighth overall. The fourth Indian swimmer competing at the meet, Tanish George Mathew, managed to finish 29th in 50m freestyle heats with a timing of 24:29.

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