Gymnastics: Dipa Karmakar wins India’s first gold at Asian Championships

Karmakar had previously won the bronze medal in the 2015 edition of the competition in Hiroshima, Japan.

Ace Indian gymnast Dipa Karmakar became the first Indian to win a gold medal when she won the vault event at the Asian Gymnastics Championships, in Tashkent, Uzbekistan on Sunday.

Previously, India had won only four bronze medals across different editions of the competition. Karmakar was the first Indian woman to win a medal at the event after she won bronze at the 2015 edition in Hiroshima, Japan.

On Sunday though, Karmakar scored a total of 13.566 in the vault discipline – her per event – to pip North Korea’s Kim Son Hyang, who scored 13.466 points to finish in second position.

The win however, comes days after Karmakar failed to secure a berth for the 2024 Olympics Games after she finished 16th in the all-around event of the competition that was held on Friday, meaning that there will be no Indian participation in the gymnastics event in Paris.

Karmakar, 30, has endured a challenging past few years in her career as she has had to deal with injuries and a doping charge.

She returned to the sport after her suspension period ended and had topped the trials for the Asian Games, but was surprisingly not allowed to go for the multi-sports event in Hangzhou.

Karmakar had finished fourth in the vault event when she competed in the vault event at the Rio Olympics in 2016.