Asian Games: Kiran Baliyan Bags Bronze in Women's Shot Put With 17.36m Throw, Manpreet Kaur Finishes Fifth

India’s Kiran Baliyan bagged a bronze medal in the women’s Shot Put final at the Asian Games on Friday with a throw of 17.36m, in her third attempt.

Baliyan started off with a throw of 15.42 metres, however, her second throw of 16.84m helped her rise to third place. The Indian athlete cemented her podium place by bettering her previous throw, as she hurled the Shot Put to a distance of 17.36m on her third attempt.

Baliyan managed to throw a distance of 16.79m and 16.87m as she clinched a podium finish, adding another bronze to India’s tally in Hangzhou. China’s Lijiao Gong won the gold medal with a throw of 19.58m whereas her compatriot Jiayuan won silver with a throw of 18.92m.

The other Indian in the fray, Manpreet Kaur finished fifth, her best throw of 16.25 wasn’t enough to give the Indian a podium finish. She was briefly in fourth place, but Chen-Xin Jian of Chinese Taipei came up with her personal throw of 16.61m to push down Manpreet to fifth.

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It was a dominant show from the gold medalist, Lijiao Gong who was head and shoulders above all the competition. Jiayuan couldn’t come close to her compatriot while the Indian Baliyan too wasn’t challenged much once she crossed the 17m barrier.

The 24-year-old had risen to 161-st place in world rankings two weeks ago, and she would be happy to have taken India’s tally at the Asian Games to 33 medals with 8 gold, 12 silver and 13 bronze medals.

For the unversed, Kiran had previously won the Indian National Games finishing first in September 2022, and she had won the National Open Championship in 2021, as well as the Federation Cup in 2021.

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Kiran had also won first place in the Indian University Championps in January 2020, and a gold in the Khelo India University Games in February 2020.