CWG shooting: Indians rule the range with two more gold (Roundup)

NEW DELHI -Indians continued to rule the Karni Singh Shooting Range picking up two gold medals from men’s pistol events besides a silver in men’s double trap individual event at the Commonwealth Games here Thursday.

India’s Vijay Kumar and Gurpreet Singh bagged the day’s first gold in the men’s 25 meter rapid fire pistol pairs and later in the day Gurpreet teamed up with Omkar Singh to finish on the top podium in men’s 10 metre air pistol. In both the events, Indians broke the Games record also set by them four years ago in Melbourne.

Vijay (587) and Gurpreet (575) shot a total of 1162 to win the gold ahead of Malaysia and Australia. They broke the Games record (1134), by a huge margin, also set by India at the Melbourne Games four years back. The record was held also by Vijay and Pemba Tamang.

“It always feels great to win the gold by breaking our own record. This time we broke the Games record by a huge margin of 28 points. It was a tough competition as all the participating teams have sent their top teams,” Vijay said.

Malaysian duo Hasli Izwan Hasan Amir (576) and Hafiz Adzha (568) shot a cumulative 1144. Australia’s Bruce Quick (563) and David Chapman (562) scored 1125.

Omkar (587) and Gurpreet (576) then totalled 1163 to break the Games record of 1154 set by Indian pair Samresh Jung and Vivek Singh four years back at the Melbourne Games.

“I didn’t realise that I have won the gold medal until I saw the scorecard. I am very happy to win the gold in my country. I will try to give my best in future,” said Omkar, who won the silver in the Sydney World Cup earlier in March.

England’s Nick Baxter (573) and Michael Gault (570) won the silver with a total of 1143 while Singapore duo Bin Gai (571) and Swee Hon Lim (568) bagged the bronze with a score of 1139.

Later in the day, a close contest saw world no. 3 Ronjan Sodhi win the silver in a three-way shot out, where his understudy and junior world champion Asher Noria finished fourth.

England’s Steve Walton got the gold with a score of 190 out of 200 while Noria, Sodhi and Isle of Man’s Tim Kneale were tied at 186 for the second place after the final round before packed stands that included defending champion Rajyavardhan Singh Rathore.

In the three-way shoot-off, Sodhi was on target in all his four attempts to clinch the silver, while teenager Noria buckled under pressure and missed his seventh shot to surrender the bronze to Kneale. Australia’s Mark Russel, 1996 Olympic champion, finished a disappointing fifth.

However, there was some disappointment as newly crowned world champion Tejaswini Sawant failed to qualify for the final of the women’s rifle three position event and her compatriot Lajja Gauswami finished sixth in the final with a total score 666.8 (570 in qualifying, 96.8 in final).

Australia bagged their first shooting gold with Alethes Sedgman finishing on the top podium in women’s 50-metre rifle three position. Alethes totalled 676 (575 in qualifying and 101 in final).

Singapore duo Xiang Wei Jasmine and Aquilah Sudhir won the silver and bronze. Jasmine shot a total of 672.6 (571 in qualifying and 101.6 in final) while Aquilah had a total of 671.3 (577 in qualifying and 94.3 in final).