India have a won a historic gold medal at the 2022 Commonwealth Games with the women's fours lawn bowls team beating South Africa 17-10 in the final.
The quartet of Lovely Choubey (lead), Rupa Rani Tirkey (slip), Pinki (second) and Nayanmoni Saikia (third) were already assured a medal on Monday, when they beat New Zealand 16-13 in the semi-final.
In Tuesday's final, India shot into the lead with an 8-2 scoreline but the South African team comprising Thabelo Muvhango (lead), Bridget Calitz (second), Esme Kruger (third) and Johanna Snyman (skip) found a way to fight their way back into the match and took the lead at one stage, at 10-8. However, the Indian team fought their way back into the game and went into end 14 with a 15-10 lead. They eventually won 17-10.
Understanding Lawn Bowls
Lawn Bowls is played in three formats essentially -- singles, doubles and fours, depending on the number of individuals pitted against each other.
The player/team which manages to place its bowls closer to the stationary target, called 'The Jack', are awarded the points.
The bowls needed to be rolled on the floor from a distance.
In the fours, or four-player, format, each team gets eight throws, or rolls, from one 'end'. One 'end' means completion of one round.
One teams has to throw the bowls from 18 ends to complete the match and it happens in a circular manner.
The team with more points after 18 ends of throws will take the contest.
How Are Points Awarded?
The number of points awarded is determined by the number of bowls a team has managed to place closer to the 'Jack' compared to its opponent.
For example: If team A places two bowls closer to 'the Jack' compared to team B's closest bowls, it will win two points for the end.
In case team A had managed to place three bowls closer to the target than team B's closest bowl, it would have been awarded three points.
India's 'Fours' Champions
The 'leader' of the team, 38-year-old Lovely is a constable with Jharkhand Police while Rupa, who too is from Ranchi, works in the sports department.
Pinki, who picked up the sport accidentally during the 2010 CWG in Delhi, is a sports teacher with DPS R K Puram in New Delhi while Nayanmoni comes from a farming family in Assam and works in the state's forest department.
Lovely used to be 100m sprinter while her teammate Nayanmoni was a weightlifter. Both had to move to a 'slow' sport like lawn bowls due to injuries.
"I got into Lawn Bowls in 2008 after leaving athletics. I won Rs 70000 in a national event and told myself I could continue with this," said Lovely who, alongside Rupa, trains at the RK Anand Bowls Green Stadium in Ranchi.
Rupa Rani, 34, has represented the country in three Commonwealth Games in triples, pairs and fours so far. She has won three bronze medals in triples and fours in the Asia-Pacific Championships so far since 2009.
(At The Quint, we question everything. Play an active role in shaping our journalism by becoming a member today.)