Vijay, Aishwarya capture mixed doubles crown

BANGALORE: Karnataka bowlers captured a gold medal and a bronze on a productive day for the state in the Canara Bank 5th National Tenpin Bowling Championships at the Blu-O bowling alley on Thursday. After Vijay Punjabi and Aishwarya Rao won the mixed doubles gold, Prathima Hedge combined well with Girish Gaba to seal the bronze in the same event.
Earlier, Aishwarya and Vijay shook off the effects of a slow start and quickly raced to 2308 pinfalls to win the gold by a difference of 48 pinfalls.Aishwarya had scores of 204, 170, 175, 195, 189, 234 while Vijay's figures read 163, 203, 188, 209, 186, 182 at an average of just over 192 pinfalls per game.
New Delhi's brother-sister combine of Dhruv Sarda and Sugandha Sarda bagged the silver medal by scoring 2260 pinfalls, with Dhruv clearly the star of the day. The youngster, who started with 181 pinfalls in the first game, posted five consecutive scores of 200 or above - 200, 248, 201, 222 and 239 -- to guide his team to the top of the leaderboard.
Meanwhile, Girish and Prathima were steady in their ascendance as they posted 2244 pinfalls, just enough for a bronze.
In the Women's All Events, Aishwarya (Karnataka) continues to lead the table with 2264 pinfalls, followed by Sabeena Saleem (Tamil Nadu) with 2217 and Prathima (Karnataka ) with 2179 pinfalls.
In the Men's All Events, Dhruv (New Delhi) continues to lead the pack with 2586 pinfalls while Akaash Ashok Kumar (Karnataka) is in second position with 2443 pinfalls, followed by Shabbir Dhankot (Tamil Nadu) with 2397.
Results: Mixed Doubles (top five): 1. Aishwarya Rao/ Vijay Punjabi (Kar, 2308 pinfalls); 2. Sugandha Sarda/ Dhruv Sarda (Del, 2260); 3. Prathima Hegde/ Girish Gaba (Kar, 2244); 4. Anuradha Sarda/ Hameed (Del, 2208); 5. Anukriti/ Mohan Lal (Har, 2191).