{"id":264422,"date":"2026-09-25T18:58:54","date_gmt":"2026-09-25T18:58:54","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/sports.runfyers.com\/index.php\/2026\/09\/25\/couldnt-believe-i-had-won-a-medal-says-baranica\/"},"modified":"2026-09-25T18:58:54","modified_gmt":"2026-09-25T18:58:54","slug":"couldnt-believe-i-had-won-a-medal-says-baranica","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/sports.runfyers.com\/index.php\/2026\/09\/25\/couldnt-believe-i-had-won-a-medal-says-baranica\/","title":{"rendered":"Couldn\u2019t believe I had won a medal, says Baranica"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><\/p>\n<div>\n<div class=\"picture verticle\"><picture><!--[if IE 9]><video style=\"display: none;\"><![endif]--><source media=\"(min-width: 1600px)\" sizes=\"960px\" srcset=\"https:\/\/th-i.thgim.com\/public\/incoming\/hpcyz6\/article71510321.ece\/alternates\/LANDSCAPE_1200\/55_RVM_0055.jpg\"\/><source media=\"(min-width: 768px) and (max-width: 1599px)\" sizes=\"640px\" srcset=\"https:\/\/th-i.thgim.com\/public\/incoming\/hpcyz6\/article71510321.ece\/alternates\/LANDSCAPE_1200\/55_RVM_0055.jpg\"\/><source media=\"(min-width: 321px) and (max-width: 767px)\" sizes=\"400px\" srcset=\"https:\/\/th-i.thgim.com\/public\/incoming\/hpcyz6\/article71510321.ece\/alternates\/LANDSCAPE_660\/55_RVM_0055.jpg\"\/><source media=\"(max-width: 320px)\" sizes=\"320px\" srcset=\"https:\/\/th-i.thgim.com\/public\/incoming\/hpcyz6\/article71510321.ece\/alternates\/LANDSCAPE_320\/55_RVM_0055.jpg\"\/><!--[if IE 9]><\/video><![endif]--><\/picture><\/div>\n<p class=\"caption\">\n                    India&#8217;s Baranica Elangovan won the bronze medal in the pole vault event at the Asian Games in Japan on September 25, 2026.<br \/>\n                                          | Photo Credit: R.V. Moorthy\n                                      <\/p>\n<\/div>\n<div id=\"content-body-71509646\">\n<div class=\"schemaDiv\" id=\"schemaDiv\" itemprop=\"articleBody\">\n<p>Baranica Elangovan won a historic first-ever bronze in pole vault at the <a href=\"https:\/\/www.thehindu.com\/topic\/asian-games-2026\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Asian Games<\/a>, but as long as it took for the event to finally conclude as Misaki Morota tried to cross the 4.61m mark, it took longer for the Indian to accept she had actually won a medal.<\/p>\n<p class=\"referpara\"><strong><b>Also read | <a href=\"https:\/\/www.thehindu.com\/sport\/athletics\/asian-games-2026-persistence-and-drama-as-indias-mixed-relay-team-seema-win-medals\/article71505161.ece\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Persistence and drama as India\u2019s mixed relay team, Seema win medals<\/a><\/b><\/strong><\/p>\n<p>\u201cThe other Indian pole vaulter, Sindhushree, told me I had won bronze, but I did not believe her. I kept checking again and again and again. Even when my coach Milber Bertrand Russell told me to look up at the big screen for the official confirmation, I was not sure, I wanted him to confirm from the officials. It is so surreal that I don\u2019t think I will believe it till I actually get it in my hands,\u201d a dazed but elated Baranica admitted.<\/p>\n<p>Baranica\u2019s medal came soon after Gulveer Singh, the man who runs like a machine and with as much consistency, improved on his bronze medal from Hangzhou 2023 with a silver in the 10,000m. With two more events he\u2019s entered in, Gulveer was desperate to slip out for rest and recovery. Not surprisingly, he was more than satisfied with the medal. \u201cI have no fixed target in terms of the timings because then I will get stuck on that. Only target is to win medals and keep improving,\u201d an exhausted Gulveer said.<\/p>\n<div class=\"also-read print-hide\" data-ga-label=\"AlsoReadArticle\">\n<div class=\"element\">\n<div class=\"picture\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/th-i.thgim.com\/public\/incoming\/lhsfjw\/article71509649.ece\/alternates\/SQUARE_80\/46_RVM_1487.jpg\" data-original=\"https:\/\/th-i.thgim.com\/public\/incoming\/lhsfjw\/article71509649.ece\/alternates\/SQUARE_80\/46_RVM_1487.jpg\" alt=\"\" data-device-variant=\"SQUARE~SQUARE~SQUARE~SQUARE\" class=\"media-object lazy adaptive placeholder lazy\" width=\"100%\" height=\"100%\"\/><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<p>Shot-putter Manpreet Kaur, meanwhile, insisted there was more to come. \u201cThere is more to be done; I can get a lot better. But I am still learning a lot of new things under coach Parveer Singh in terms of technique, strength and throwing angles. He kept guiding me even today, suggesting changes that helped me get better,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<div class=\"update-publish-time article-published-time-end\">\n<p class=\"publish-time-new\"> Published <span>&#8211; September 26, 2026 12:28 am IST<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.thehindu.com\/sport\/couldnt-believe-i-had-won-a-medal-says-baranica\/article71509646.ece\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Source link <\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>India&#8217;s Baranica Elangovan won the bronze medal in the pole vault event at the Asian Games in Japan on September 25, 2026. | Photo Credit: R.V. Moorthy Baranica Elangovan won a historic first-ever bronze in pole vault at the Asian Games, but as long as it took for the event to finally conclude as Misaki [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":264423,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"tdm_status":"","tdm_grid_status":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[6802],"tags":[76348,76347,76310,76349,76350],"class_list":{"0":"post-264422","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-athetics","8":"tag-asian-games-2026-athletics-gulveer","9":"tag-asian-games-2026-india-atheltics-baranica","10":"tag-asian-games-2026-india-athletics","11":"tag-asian-games-2026-india-athletics-medals","12":"tag-asian-games-2026-india-medals"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/sports.runfyers.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/264422","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/sports.runfyers.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/sports.runfyers.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sports.runfyers.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sports.runfyers.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=264422"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/sports.runfyers.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/264422\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sports.runfyers.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/264423"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/sports.runfyers.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=264422"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sports.runfyers.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=264422"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sports.runfyers.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=264422"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}