Sajan, Srihari set the pool on fire

Sajan eased to the 400m freestyle gold and then improved his own record in 100m butterfly by clocking 53.83 seconds against his last year’s mark of 54.43 while Srihari ended the 200m backstroke in 2:03.89 to clip more than a second off the National record of 2:05.20.

Kerala's Sajan Prakash created a new meet record in the 100m butterfly event at the 71st Senior National Aquatic Championship on Monday.

The burden of expectations is surely resting lightly on the shoulders of Sajan Prakash and Srihari Natraj. Sajan added two more gold medals — one by improving his meet record — to raise his tally to four and Srihari set a second National record in two days to liven up the third day of the National aquatics championship here on Monday.

Sajan eased to the 400m freestyle gold and then improved his own record in 100m butterfly by clocking 53.83 seconds against his last year’s mark of 54.43.

Srihari ended the 200m backstroke in 2:03.89 to clip more than a second off the National record of 2:05.20 he set in the Asian age-group championship in Tashkent last month. In the process, Srihari also erased the previous meet record of 2:05.46 by Arvind Mani last year.

The day’s other record came in the mixed 4x50m freestyle relay where Railways quartet clocked 1:41.54 to beat Maharashtra’s 2015 effort of 1:42.39.

RESULTS Men: 400m freestyle: 1. Sajan Prakash (Ker, 3:38.53), 2. Saurabh Sangvekar (Rlys, 4:00.31), 3. Kushagra Rawat (Del, 4:03.53); 200m backstroke: 1. Srihari Nataraj (Kar, 2:03.89, NR, old 2:05.46, 2017); 2. T. Sethumanickavel (TN, 2:07.34), 3. Advait Page MP, 2:07.65); 100m butterfly: 1. Sajan Prakash (Ker, 53.83, NMR, old 54.43, 2016); 2. Supriya Mondal (Rlys, 55.33), 3. Avinash Mani (Kar, 55.68). Women: 50m freestyle: 1. A. V. Jayaveena (TN, 27.35), 2. Aditi Dhumatkar (Rlys, 27.37), 3. Avantika Chavan (Rlys, 27.40). 1500m freestyle: V. Malavika (Kar, 17.59.08), 2. Bhavika Dugar (TN, 18:08.00), 3. Khushi Dinesh (Kar, 18:24.35); 200m backstroke: 1. Soubrity Mondal (Ben, 2:27.33), 2. Suvana Baskar (Kar, 2:28.14), 3. Yuga Birnale (Mah, 2:31.24); 100m butterfly: 1. Shivani Kataria (Har, 1:04.37); 2. Divya Satija (Har, 1;04.45), 3. Trishna Karkhanis (Mah, 1:04.83). 4x200m freestyle relay: 1. Karnataka (9:13.11), 2. Tamil Nadu (9:20.12), 3. Maharashtra (9:26.04).  Mixed: 4x50m freestyle relay: 1. Railways (1:41.54, NMR, old 1:42.39, 2015), 2. Karnataka (1:43.71), 3. Maharashtra (1:44.42).