Target Olympic Podium Scheme: Indian para sprinter Simran Sharma clinched her second gold medal of the Aichi-Nagoya 2026 Asian Para Games, winning the women’s 100m T12 final with a Games-record time of 12.02 seconds on Wednesday, improving her own mark set in the heats.
Simran, supported by the Target Olympic Podium Scheme (TOPS), bettered her previous Games record of 12.13 seconds to seal the gold medal. She had won silver in the same event at the 2022 Asian Para Games in Hangzhou with a timing of 12.68 seconds, improving her time by 0.66 seconds and upgrading her medal to gold.
Earlier, Simran set a new Games record with 24.80 seconds to win gold in women's 200m T12 category on Tuesday. Simran, a Paris Paralympic 2024 bronze medallist in the T12 category and a world champion in the 100m, improved from silver in Hangzhou 2022 (26.12 seconds) to gold in 2026, improving her time by 1.32 seconds. In the same event, debutante Tejalben Damor, a visually impaired T12 para-athlete from Gujarat, also delivered a commendable performance, securing third place with a time of 25.23 seconds and achieving a personal best (PB).