{"id":2948,"date":"2026-01-24T18:38:38","date_gmt":"2026-01-24T18:38:38","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/nctvbharat.com\/?p=2948"},"modified":"2026-01-24T18:38:38","modified_gmt":"2026-01-24T18:38:38","slug":"kiwg-2026-ladakhs-women-skaters-win-first-gold-for-kiwg-hosts","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/nctvbharat.com\/index.php\/2026\/01\/24\/kiwg-2026-ladakhs-women-skaters-win-first-gold-for-kiwg-hosts\/","title":{"rendered":"KIWG 2026: Ladakh\u2019s women skaters win first gold for KIWG hosts"},"content":{"rendered":"

Leh (Ladakh).<\/strong><\/p>\n

Hosts Ladakh won their first gold medal of the Khelo India Winter Games 2026 when their women\u2019s relay quartet won the 2000 metres short track race at the Nawang Dorjay Stobdan (NDS) Stadium here on Saturday. However, Haryana raced to two more gold medals from short-track skating to lead the medal standing with four golds overall. The biggest story of the day was Chandigarh beating Ladakh to enter the final of the men\u2019s ice-hockey competition.<\/p>\n

The 5000 capacity NDS Stadium was overflowing when the men\u2019s ice-hockey semifinals began later in the day. In what was surely the \u2018final\u2019 before Monday\u2019s grand finale, Army defeated arch-rivals ITBP 2-0, with goals coming from Jigmat Kunzang in the 18th minute of the first (20-minute) period and Padma Norboo in the sixth minute of the third period.<\/p>\n

Army had beaten ITBP 2-1 in last year\u2019s final and Saturday\u2019s semifinal was fiercely contested with both teams indulging in body play. Kunzang and Norboo managed to break open the ITBP defence that looked leaky at times. The second goal ITBP conceded was a soft one as Norboo scored from a long-range push that beat the goalie.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

In the second men\u2019s ice-hockey semis, unfancied Chandigarh stunned Ladakh 3-2 to enter the final against Army. Chandigarh came from a goal down to score three in a row through Gurtej Singh Bhatti (twice) and Unnatveer Singh to script an unbelievable victory. Earlier, Chandigarh women had won an ice-hockey bronze medal after beating Himachal Pradesh 4-3 in extra time.<\/p>\n

Ladakh rise to No. 2 in medal tally
\nBy virtue of winning the 2000m short track relay at the NDS, hosts Ladakh rose to the No. 2 position in the medal tally. The Ladakh quartet of Skarma Tsultim, Shabana Zara, Tasnia Shameem, Insha Fatima were simply too strong for the racers from Karnataka and Maharashtra, the only teams to qualify for the final. In a race full of flips and crashes, Ladakh too had falls, but came back strong to win gold.<\/p>\n

Sachin Singh of Haryana was the toast of the day for Haryana. He first won the men\u2019s 500m short track sprint and then helped his state clinch the 3000 metres short track relay gold ahead of Karnataka (silver) and Himachal Pradesh (bronze). Sachin thus became the first skater in KIWG to win two gold medals.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s a great win for me today. This is the first time I\u2019ve won a gold medal at the national level, and I\u2019m proud to be representing Haryana. The best part has been the support from my coach, my managers, and the Haryana association. My managers, Deepak Kohar and (Kunal) Lohan ji, have supported me throughout this championship, and it means a lot to me,\u201d said 26-year-old Sachin to SAI Media. Sachin trains at the Youngsters Academy in Dehradun. \u201cThis gold medal is the result of everyone\u2019s hard work and support,\u201d he added.<\/p>\n

Nayana\u2019s lucky ground<\/strong>
\nKhelo India Winter Games has always been a happy hunting ground for Telangana\u2019s Nayana Sri Talluri. The upcoming Telangana skater won her first gold of KIWG 2026 in the women\u2019s 500m short track on Saturday. It was the 17-year-old\u2019s fourth consecutive gold in 500m short course.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt feels wonderful to have won again. I have been a hat-trick gold medallist at Khelo India Winter Games in 2025 and I have been in four consecutive years. I feel absolutely amazing right now. The other skaters were excellent and gave me very tough competition, which makes this achievement even more special. I\u2019m really proud to have come here and achieved this milestone,\u201d said Nayana to SAI Media. She now trains in Canada and flew into Leh especially for these Games.<\/p>\n

SATURDAY\u2019S RESULTS<\/strong>
\nICE SKATING FINALS<\/strong>
\n(Short track 500m men): 1. Sachin Singh (Haryana) 46.14 sec 2. Ishaan Darvekar (Maharashtra) 46.36 sec 3. Muthakani Vishnu Vardhan (Telangana) 47.31 sec.
\n(Short track 500m women): 1. Nayana Sri Talluri (Telangana) 50.49 sec 2. Schaleen Farnandes (Maharashtra) 51.44 sec 3. Anvayee Deshpande (Maharashtra) 51.53 sec.
\n(Short track relay 3000m men): 1. Haryana (Sachin Singh, Aarav Singhal, Jai Yadav, Rohit Kumar) 5:16.96 2. Karnataka (GV Raghavendra, Dheemanth Mahesh, Srivatsa S Rao, Omkara Yogaraj) 5:17.23 3. Himachal Pradesh (Kaushal Thakur, Divyansh Thakur, Samarth Attri, Ashutosh) 7:08.89 seconds.
\n(Short track relay 2000m women): 1. Ladakh (Skarma Tsultim, Shabana Zara, Tasnia Shameem, Insha Fatima) 3:49.23 secs 2. Karnataka (Srija S Rao, Sahasra Nellaturi, H Ramganesh, Shreedhanya P) 4:36.71. 3. Maharashtra \u2013 disqualified.<\/p>\n

ICE HOCKEY<\/strong>
\n(Women\u2019s bronze medal match) Chandigarh beat Himachal Pradesh 4-3 in extra time.
\nMen\u2019s semis: Army beat ITBP 2-0; Chandigarh beat Ladakh 3-2.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Leh (Ladakh). Hosts Ladakh won their first gold medal of the Khelo India Winter Games 2026 when their women\u2019s relay quartet won the 2000 metres short track race at the Nawang Dorjay Stobdan (NDS) Stadium here on Saturday. However, Haryana raced to two more gold medals from short-track skating to lead the medal standing with …<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":2949,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[144],"tags":[45,1326,1267,1316,1266,1325,76,1324,1269,893],"class_list":["post-2948","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-leh-ladakh-2","tag-himachal-pradesh","tag-itbp","tag-khelo-india-winter-games","tag-khelo-india-winter-games-2026","tag-khelo-india-winter-games-in-leh","tag-nawang-dorjay-stobdan","tag-nctv-bharat","tag-sports-in-india","tag-sports-in-leh","tag-sports-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/nctvbharat.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2948","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/nctvbharat.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/nctvbharat.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nctvbharat.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nctvbharat.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2948"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/nctvbharat.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2948\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2951,"href":"https:\/\/nctvbharat.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2948\/revisions\/2951"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nctvbharat.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2949"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/nctvbharat.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2948"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nctvbharat.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2948"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nctvbharat.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2948"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}