Nethra Kumanan is the 10th Indian athlete to qualify for a Sailing event at the Olympics, but she is the first from the country to have booked a direct quota place by topping a qualifier.
Nethra Kumanan on Thursday qualified for the Tokyo Olympics by coming first at the Laser Radial event in the Mussanah Open Championship, a joint Asian and African Olympic qualifying event.
Kumanan will be the 10th Indian to qualify for a sailing event in the Olympics, but all the earlier nine had been male athletes. All the earlier nine had made it to the Olympics by getting nominated for quota places that were not filled up through the qualifiers.
The Indians who previously qualified for sailing at Olympics were Nachhatar Singh Johal (2008), Shroff and Sumeet Patel (2004), F Tarapore and Cyrus Cama (1992), Kelly Rao (1988), Dhruv Bhandari (1984), Soli Contractor and AA Basith (1972).
Kumanan is the first Indian to have booked a direct quota place by topping a qualifier.
