Sharath Kamal created history when he won three golds and a silver in the 2022 Commonwealth Games. This took his Commonwealth Games medal tally to 13 medals out of which 7 are gold. At the 2022 Commonwealth Games, he won gold in singles, mixed-doubles with Sreeja Akula and team events with Sathiyan Gnanasekaran, Harmanpreet Desai and Sanil Shetty. He won silver with Gnanasekaran.
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Sharath Kamal is an Indian professional Table Tennis player. He is a nine-time Senior National Table Tennis Champion and was awarded the Padma Shri, the fourth-highest civilian award, in 2019.
Kamal was born on July 12, 1982, in Chennai city of Tamil Nadu. When Sharath was four years old, his father introduced him to table tennis. At the 2002 National Games of India, he won bronze in the singles and mixed doubles competitions. At the National Table Tennis Championships in 2003, Sharath won the title for the first time. In 2004, he won the nationals once more. Kamal won the senior nationals five times in a row between 2006 and 2010.
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Sharath was chosen to compete in the 2003 World Table Tennis Championships, but he lost in the first round of the competition’s main draw. For the 2004 World Team Table Tennis Championships, Sharath was chosen. He qualified for the 2004 Athens Olympics in the same year but lost in the second round of his first Olympic competition.
At the 2006 Commonwealth Games, Sharath competed for the first time. Sharath went on to win the gold medal in both the singles and the team categories. He competed in his first Asian Games in 2006 but was defeated in the first round. Sharath earned a spot in the 2008 Olympics but was defeated in the second round.
Sharath Kamal competes in the Men’s singles, men’s doubles, mixed doubles, and men’s team categories representing team India.
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The Tamil athlete has won eight medals in the commonwealth games. He has won 7 golds (2006 Melbourne Commonwealth Games-singles and team, 2010 Delhi Commonwealth Games- doubles, 2018 Gold Coast Commonwealth Games- team, and 2022 Birmingham Commonwealth Games-singles, mixed, team), 3 silver (2018 Gold Coast Commonwealth Games- doubles, 2022 Birmingham Commonwealth Games-doubles), and 3 bronzes (2010 Delhi Commonwealth Games- team and 2018 Gold Coast Commonwealth Games- singles and doubles) over the course of his career. He also won two bronze medals in the team and doubles category in the 2018 Jakarta Asian Games.