Swimming News -

Four months training stint in Australia started showing results for Veerdhawal Khade and Sandeep Sejwal … They r participated in the 51st Malaysia Invitation Open swimming meet to qualify for the Beijing Olympics.

Veerdhawal Khade won 100M Freestyle event with new meet and Indian National record of 50.66 seconds … Which was well below of Olympic qualification mark of 50.95.

Sandeep Sejwal also won 100M breaststroke event with new meet and Indian National record of 1:03.58 … This was also well below of Olympics qualification mark of 1:03.72, so he became second swimmer to qualify for Beijing Olympics... He also broke the national record in 200M breaststroke by clocking 2:18.23 to qualify for Olympics in this event.

Veerdhawal wasn’t happy with his performance as he was hoping to clocking 49 seconds in 100M freestyle event … He is also participating in 50M, 200M & 400M freestyle events and 50M & 100M butterfly events … He is trying to qualify for more events at Beijing Olympics.

Veerdhawal broke national records in M butterfly & M freestyle events clocking 24.91 & 4:01.87 respectively.

Shikha Tandon won the 100M freestyle event in 57.98, which was a new National record … But was well below qualifying mark 57.17 seconds.

Rehan Poncha finished second in the 200M butterfly event in 2:02.90, a personal best but again well below Olympic qualifying time of 2:01.79.
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At U-16 Asia-Oceania Davis Cup Qualifying Tournament, New Delhi, India

Semi-Finals -
India bt Australia 3-0

Saurabh Singh (IND) bt Jarryd Chaplin (AUS) 63 63
Yuki Bhambri (IND) bt Maverick Banes (AUS) 64 62
Yuki Bhambri (IND)/ Saurabh Singh (IND) bt Jarryd Chaplin (AUS)/ Maverick Banes (AUS) W/O

Terrific win against top seed Australia ... Now our boys meet Japan in the final to get top-4 seedings in the world group.

This type of performance from Yuki was expected but pleasant surprise package and find of the tournament is undoubtedly Saurabh Singh ... Very impressive performance from him the way he is handling all these higher ranked players ... In the final Japanese having tough time to find what strike them.
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At $ 25k Balikpapan Challenger, Indonesia

[QF] (2) LAKHANI Isha (IND,338) bt (WC) DAMAYANTI Ayu-Fani (INA,903) 64 46 63
[SF] (2) LAKHANI Isha (IND,338) bt CHERNYAKOVA Elena (RUS,NR) W/O

Good to see that she is performing as per ranking in abroad ... Hopefully this performance build urge in her to play more tournaments in abroad and succeed.
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Tennis News -
At $25k Coatzacoalcos Challenger, Mexico

[R1] (Q) UBEROI Shikha (IND,894) l (8) FITZPATRICK Anna (GBR,332) 67(2) 26

This match gave us some picture of Shikha's current level of play ... She is improved but she is still travel long way to reach where she was before her injury break.