Naorem Roshibina Devi Gets Bronze in Wushu

Jakarta, 22 August 2018: In another brilliant story, 17-year old Naorem Roshibina Devi fought like a true champion against some of the best in Asia. Ultimately, she settled for the bronze medal as she lost to Cai Yingying of China in the semifinals of the Women’s Sanda 60kg in the ongoing 2018 Asian Games.

Venue: The Jakarta International Expo Hall on Wednesday.

Day: Wednesday, 22nd August

Sport: Wushu


Earlier in the day, she breezed through the quarter final after defeating Pakistan’s MUBASHRA 2-0 in the same category. The rule of these Games is that both losing semi-finalists get a bronze, so once our athletes get into the semi-final stage, the celebrations can more or less begin in India.

Roshibina Devi made the entire nation proud with a bronze medal in a very unique sport called Wushu. While most of the cheers go out to the top stars in cricket, football, tennis and others, we should take the time out to congratulate these heroes as well. However, do all of our readers know about the sport in question?

Roshibina Devi
Image courtesy: Twitter

What is Wushu?

Basically, this is a full-contact sport, or a type of martial arts, which is also referred to as Chinese kungfu. It appears to look like modern kickboxing or MMA, but has more grappling techniques. Wushu Sanda in particular, is a type of martial art which was developed by the Chinese military and was based on the practices and studies of traditional Kungfu mixed with modern combat techniques.

Overall, it was a brilliant day for India, particularly in the sport of Wushu. What was very much an unknown sport in India will now be studied and we may have many Wushu stars in the making as Devi wasn’t the only one to win a medal in Wushu today. It was India’s best Asian Games Wushu performance, as four athletes reached the semi-finals stage.

All four lost their respective semi finals, but that meant four bronze medals coming home, as the medal’s count surged today for Team India. Santosh Kumar, Surya Bhanu Partap Singh and Narender Grewal also won medals in Wushu Sanda, with Grewal also having won a medal at the 2014 Incheon Asian Games.

For all latest updates on the 2018 Asian Games, visit Sports Team of India.

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