Home favourite Giuliana Poveda was the star of the Peru Para Badminton International 2020, winning all three of her finals on Sunday in Lima.
The 18-year-old proved she is in good form by lifting the women’s singles, women’s doubles and mixed doubles titles at the penultimate qualifying event for the Tokyo 2020 Paralympic Games, adding to her two first place finishes at the Brazil Para Badminton International the previous week.
The Short Stature (SH6) world champion first combined with India’s Nagar Krishna to defeat her compatriots Hector Jesus Salva Tunque/Rubi Milagros Fernandez Vargas 21-12 21-15 in the mixed doubles final.
She then beat American women’s singles rival Katherine Valli 21-7 21-16 in 24 minutes before completing her haul by clinching the women’s doubles gold.
Poveda later combined with Valli to get the better of fellow Peruvians Vargas and Rosa Luisa Velasquez Turin 21-13 21-7.
Her success contributed to Peru’s overall tally of 10 medals.
Although Poveda had a field day, India finished with the most gold medals – seven.
Pramod Bhagat continued his fine form – the 31-year-old had two podium finishes in Brazil – by bagging another double. Krishna was another double titlist, also winning the SH6 men’s singles event.
Bhagat paired up with countryman Manoj Sarkar to beat French pair Guillaume Gailly/Mathieu Thomas for the Standing Lower (SL3) men’s doubles crown before seeing off fellow Indian Kumar Nitesh in the men’s singles final.
India’s other gold medals came in Standing Upper (SU5) mixed doubles (Raj Kumar/Rakesh Pandey), SL4 men’s singles (Suhas Lalinakere Yathiraj) and Wheelchair (WH1-2) (Prem Kumar Ale).