Sushmita, Duana bow out of Olympics; Prince falls short against 'King' Viktor

By A Staff Reporter,Kathmandu, July 29: Nepal’s shooter Sushmita Nepal and swimmer Duana Lama ended their campaign at the 2024 Paris Olympics after losing in the preliminary stages of their respective events.

Sushmita finished 42nd out of 44 participants in the 10m Air Rifle Women’s Qualification. She was followed by Luna Solomon, who was representing refugees. Algeria’s Houda Chaabi did not get a rank as she did not participate. 

The shooting event occurred at Chateauroux in central France where Sushmita earned 607.8 out of 654 points in six attempts. She earned 104.5 in the first series, 101.7 in the second, 100.7 in the third, 99.9 in the fourth, 102.2 in the fifth and 98.2 in the sixth.

Sushmita’s national record in the category is 619.1 points out of 654. 

As per the competition fixtures, only eight of the 44 participants would progress to the next stage, the final, based on points. Shooters from Norway, Switzerland, China, India, Kazakhstan, the USA and France have qualified for the final scheduled on Monday. 

Similarly, Nepal’s Duana Lama could not show her ability to its best as she was injured. 

“Three days ago, Duana got injured while she was going for physiotherapy. Diagnosis showed the recurrence of an old ailment in her ankle. In a short period, she got herself fit enough to participate, but not challenge others,” said Nayana Shakya, Nepal’s swimming coach.

Duana finished last among the seven swimmers participating at Heat 1 in Women's 200m Freestyle. She completed the distance at 2:20.74 minutes. 

India’s Dhinidhi Desinghu finished first (2:06.96) and was followed by Ariana Dirkzwager of Laos (2:07.22) and Jehanara Nabi of Pakistan (2:10.69). 

In the overall heat round result, Duana finished in 30th position. Out of 31 swimmers, Hungary’s Nikolett Padar was disqualified from the heat round.

Prince loses to King

“'King' Viktor Axelsen of Denmark lords over Nepal's Prince Dahal to open Paris 2024 campaign,” is the headline of the article on badminton results by the Olympics on its website.

Prince faced Viktor in his first of the three group-stage matches. While Prince ranks 172nd in world rankings, Viktor was recently demoted to World No. 2.

Viktor lost his No. 1 ranking, which lasted for 132 weeks (more than 2.5 years), in June 2024 to China’s Shi Yuqi. 

Viktor defeated Prince easily with the scores of 21-8 and 21-6 in Group P. The match lasted for 28 minutes in total.

Talking to Olympics.com after the match, Viktor said, “I think today was a good start for me you know, with all due respect, Prince and I, maybe the level of tournaments we usually play there's a little bit of a difference. “But today I really wanted to come in and set a high pace from the start and really get a feel of the whole, and I think that I managed to do so.”

Nevertheless, Prince, who was once world’s No. 1 junior badminton player, aims a medal at the 2028 LA Olympics. He still has two matches remaining in the current edition.

Prince will face Ireland’s Nguyen Nhat on July 29 and Israel’s Zilberman Misha on July 31. The Irish and Israeli players rank 43rd and 59th in world rankings.