Bellary (Karnataka), May 24 (IANS): Five boys from Haryana and Uttar Pradesh progressed to the quarter-finals as boxers from these states continued their impressive run at the 2022 Sub-junior Girls' and Boys' National Boxing Championships here.
Vinit Kumar began the day brilliantly for Haryana when he outclassed Rajasthan's Chandra Shekhar by a unanimous decision in the 40kg pre-quarterfinal bout at the Inspire Institute of Sports here on Tuesday.
Hunny (43kg), Mahesh (46kg), and Lokesh (64kg) further extended Haryana's dominance with victories by similar margins. While Hunny and Mahesh thrashed Telangana's Sana Ulla and Nikhil Goud respectively, Lokesh defeated Uttar Pradesh's Pritam Gupta, the Boxing Federation of India informed in a release on Tuesday.
Yogesh Danda was the fifth Haryana boxer to make his way into the last-8 stage after beating Pondicherry's Prithvi by RSC verdict in the 52kg category.
Producing equally dominant performances, four other Uttar Pradesh pugilists -- MD Faiz (61kg), Lakshya Singh Parihar (40kg), Vishal Yadav (67kg), and Vishu Rajtun (70kg) -- clinched RSC wins in their respective pre-quarter-finals while Ravi Gond had to work hard during his 55kg match against Assam's Shahiman Newar but managed to win by a split 4-1 decision.
While Faiz and Lakshya defeated Andhra Pradesh's Teja Krishna Yadav and Uttarakhand's Karan Adhikari respectively, Vishal and Vishnu outpunched Maharashtra's Shivam Ijagaj and Orissa's Akash Kumar Panigrahi.
Delhi's Shivam and Lovjeet, an' Chandigarh's Loven and Nittin were among the other pugilists who entered the quarter-finals with strong performances. Shivam (49kg) and Lovjeet (58kg) registered identical 5-0 wins against their respective opponents from Maharashtra, Atharva Naik, and Atharva Bhatt.
While Nittin made light work of Telangana's Pranav Shiva to win by a 5-0 margin in the 37kg category, in the 70kg last-16 bout, Loven notched up a commanding RSC win against Madhya Pradesh's Suryabhan Singh.
The ongoing championship has been witnessing the participation of 621 boxers, including 348 in the boys' section, from 31 teams across the country. Each bout consists of three rounds of two minutes each with a minute's break between each round.