Shiva Keshavan won gold at Asian Luge Championship

Sheva Keshavan, the Winter Olympian from India, won the gold medal at Asian Luge Championship on 23 December 2016. He braved an injury to clinch the gold at the championship in Nagano.

Keshavan who dominated the event finished the 2 heat race in 1:39.962 seconds. 103.4 km/hr was his top speed in the race.

Tanaka Shohei of Japan clinched the silver medal in the event with a combined time of 1:44.874 seconds. His top speed was 124.6 km/hr. On the other hand, the bronze medal went to Chinese Taipei’s Lien Te-An. He completed the race in 45.120 with a top speed of 126.3 km/hr.

Asian Luge Cup

• It is an annual Luge competition for Asian countries and it came into existence in 1998.

• The competition is held in different formats, namely men’s and women’s single events and men’s double events.

• All editions of the competition are held by Spiral bobsleigh luge, and skeleton track at Nagano, Japan.

Injury of Keshavan

Earlier in the third week of December 2016, he suffered a crash and broke his sled and suffered tendon damage on his left foot. He suffered the accident during a training in which he recorded his best time (at over 130km/h) in training. Due to this injury, he was not able to participate in the official training.

Apart from this, earlier in 2016, he was forced to withdraw his nomination from the 2016 World Championships. He withdrew his name from the competition due to lack of funds.

As per reports, he is slated to participate in the 2017 World Championship that will be held in Innsbruck, Austria. He will also compete on the World Cup circuit in the lead up to the qualification process for the 2018 Olympic Winter Games in Korea.