Indian veteran athlete Manpreet Kaur won the bronze medal in the women’s shot put at the Asian Games after producing a best throw of 17.17 metres at the Nagoya City Mizuho Park Athletic Stadium on Friday.
Manpreet registered the mark with her fourth attempt to finish third behind China’s Song Jiayuan, who won gold, and Zhang Linru, who took silver.
The other Indian in the event, Krishna Jayasankar Menon, also put up a strong performance, recording a best throw of 16.57 metres to finish fifth.
Manpreet, a former Asian Athletics Championships bronze medallist, had won the bronze at the 2023 edition with a throw of 17.00 metres. She was also part of India’s Commonwealth Games 2026 contingent, finishing fourth with a best effort of 17.49 metres.
The 2016 Rio Olympics was Manpreet’s first Olympic appearance, where she finished 23rd. She had won gold at the 2017 Asian Athletics Championships but was subsequently handed a four-year ban after testing positive for a banned substance, and the medal was revoked.
Manpreet returned to competition in 2022 and set a national record of 18.06 metres. She competed at the 2022 Commonwealth Games, finishing 11th, and finished fifth at the previous Asian Games.
In 2026, she won the National Inter-State Athletics Championships with a throw of 17.75 metres, comfortably clearing the Asian Games qualification standard of 16.25 metres.
With her bronze in Nagoya, Manpreet became only the third Indian woman to win an Asian Games medal in the shot put. Barbara Webster won India’s first bronze in the event in 1951, while Kiran Baliyan claimed a bronze at the 2022 Asian Games.
(IANS inputs)
