Former world number one Saurabh Chaudhary’s return to the winner’s circle was the highlight of the penultimate day while Manu Bhaker also registered back-to-back wins at the national selection trials (5 and 6) for Group A rifle and pistol shooters on Thursday.
Saurabh and Manu, who also topped the women’s 25m pistol T6 trials on Wednesday, won the men’s and women’s 10m air pistol T5 trials respectively.
These are the final round of trials before the National Rifle Association of India (NRAI) announces the squad for the World Championships in Baku in August and the Asian Games in Hangzhou from September 23.
The provisional squad of pistol and rifle shooters for the mega events is expected to be announced on June 30, the deadline set by the Indian Olympic Association (IOA) for all the national sports federations to send in the entries of athletes.
The provisional squad for shotgun has already been announced for the two events.
Paris 2024 quota winner Swapnil Kusale grabbed the men’s 50m Rifle 3 positions (3P) T6 winner’s title at the Dr. Karni Singh Shooting Range.
Saurabh topped a tight 49-man qualification round with a score of 582, emerging the leader by virtue of more inner 10s than Navy’s Ujjwal Malik and fellow Olympian Abhishek Verma, after the top three finished on the same score.
It was also certainly not the best final Saurabh had ever shot but in the end, he did enough to ward off Ujjwal, finishing with 242.2 to the Navy man’s 240.4.
Nine of Saurabh’s last 10 shots were slim to mid 10s. Udhayveer Sidhu of Punjab was third with 218.6.
Ruchita Vinerkar of the Railways topped the women’s 10m air pistol T5 qualification, logging 580 on a day of moderate scores.
Manu qualified fifth with 575, with present India international Rhythm Sangwan and Olympian Annu Raj Singh also making the top eight.
The Youth Olympic champion, however, proved to be a class apart in the final, winning by a massive 4.7 points over Haryana teammate Surbhi Rao.
Manu ended with 242.8 points after the 24-shot final. Ruchita finished third.
Swapnil, who had to miss the men’s T5 3P final on Wednesday due to visa requirements, made amends on the day with some superb shooting.
He topped the T6 qualification with a quality 591 and then led after every position in the final to finish with 461.6. Such was his dominance that the Navy’s Niraj Kumar, was a full five points behind with 456.6. Olympian Deepak Kumar of the Air Force was third with 442.8.
Among the junior results, West Bengal’s Adriyan Karmakar won the men’s 3P while Haryana’s Suruchi claimed the women’s 10m air pistol.
The men’s 10m air pistol junior event was won by another Haryana shooter Samrat Rana.
Friday, the final day of the trials, has four finals lined up including the men’s and women’s 10m air pistol T6.
Comments
0 comment