Sarabjot Singh & Sift Kaur Samra impress at the Munich Shooting World Cup
In the final rifle & pistol world cup before the Paris Olympics involving all the top athletes, India finished joint 3rd with France behind China & Norway with a Gold & Bronze courtesy Sarabjot Singh (Gold, Men’s 10m Air Pistol) & Sift Kaur Samra (Bronze, Women’s 50m Rifle 3 Positions).
Even though India got only two medals, there was Indian representation in the finals in 4 events with Indians missing out narrowly in 2 other events.
This was the only World Cup in the Rifle/Pistol discipline that India participated in this year. The results here represent a fair evaluation of where we stand currently before the Olympics. It would be interesting to see how the Indian athletes would fare after getting some time to rest & recover themselves before the Olympics.
It is worth noting that the competition at the World Cup is higher than in the Olympics with all teams fielding their best teams consisting of 3 shooters in each discipline while at the Olympics only the top 2 can participate in each discipline.
10m Air Rifle Men
Sandeep Singh who topped the NRAI trials finished 10th narrowly missing out on the finals on count back with a score of 631.4. Sheng Lihao of China topped the qualifiers with a score of 635.4.
Divyansh Singh Panwar finished 13th with a score of 631.2 while quota winner & World Champion from 2022, Rudrankksh Balasaheb Patil finished 18th with a score of 630.7.
Incidentally, the quota winner Arjun Babu competing in the Ranking Points Only (RPO) section had the highest score of 635.1 which would have seen him qualify for the finals in the 2nd spot.
10m Air Rifle Women
Ramita Jindal finished 6th in the finals after qualifying in the 4th place with a score of 633.0. Yuting Huang of China topped the qualifiers with a score of 635.3. The last qualifying score for the finals was 632.5.
Mehuli Ghosh competing in the RPO section finished 14th with a score of 631.3 while Tilottama Sen finished 34th with a score of 629.1. Most disappointing would be the performance of Paris-bound Elavenil Valarivan who finished 53rd with a score of 628.3.
10m Air Rifle Mixed Team
Neither of the Indian mixed teams could make it to the medal rounds. The duo of Elavenil Valarivan & Sandeep Singh finished in the 13th spot with a score of 630 while Ramita Jindal & Arjun Babuta finished one spot below with a score of 629.7.
The top score in qualifying was from China 1 who finished on 635.1 while the last spot for the medals round was the Republic of Korea on 632.5
25m Pistol Women
Paris-bound Esha Singh finished 6th in the finals with 20 hits off 30. She had qualified for the finals in the 6th spot with a score of 584. Nan Zhao topped the qualifiers with a score of 590 while the last spot in the finals belonged to a score of 584.
The other Indian in the field, Rhythm Sangwan finished 55th with a score of 570 in the qualification stage. Manu Bhaker had been entered in the World Cup but did not participate in the event after the NRAI qualification trials.
25m Rapid Fire Pistol Men
Vijayveer Sidhu narrowly missed out on the finals on Inner Tens, finishing 7th in the qualification with a score of 587. He had a great second day with a score of 296 after finishing day 1 with 291. German Florian Peter topped the qualifiers with a score of 593.
Bhavesh Shekawat finished 12th with a score of 583 while Anish Bhanwala finished 23rd with a score of 579. Adarsh Singh competing in the RPO section finished 62nd with a score of 544.
10m Air Pistol Women
None of the Indians could qualify for the finals with Xue Li topping the qualifiers with a score of 588 while the last qualifying score for the finals was 578.
Rhythm Sangwan finished 17th with a score of 575 while Surbhi Rao finished 45th with a score of 569 and Manu Bhaker did not start.
10m Air Pistol Men
Sarabjot Singh led the field from the start to win the gold in the finals. He never slipped out of the top spot through the entire final. He had qualified for the finals in the top spot with a score of 588. The last qualifying spot went to a score of 583.
The other Indians in the field, Arjun Singh Cheema and Varun Tomar narrowly missed out on the finals finishing 10th & 11th respectively with an identical score of 582.
10m Air Pistol Mixed Team
Sarabjot Singh combined with Rhythm Sangwan barely 2 hours after his Gold in the individual event and finished 14th with a score of 573. The other Indian duo of Arjun Singh Cheema & Surbhi Rao finished 18th with a total of 572.
China had topped the qualifiers with a score of 587 while the last qualifying spot in the medals round went to the Republic of Korea with a score of 579.
50m Rifle 3 Positions Women
Sift Kaur Samra bagged the Bronze narrowly missing out on the Silver by a margin of 0.1 points. She had qualified in the 5th spot with a score of 593 while Jiayu Han topped with a tally of 596. The last qualifying spot also went to a score of 593.
The other Indians in the field, Ashi Chauksey finished 19th with a score of 590 while Anjum Moudgil finished 28th on 589. In the RPO section, Nischal finished 35th with 588 while Shriya Sadangi was disqualified.
50m Rifle 3 Positions Men
Aishwary Pratap Singh Tomar finished 8th in the finals having qualified in the 6th spot with a score of 592. The qualifiers were topped by Yukun Liu with a total of 597 while the last qualifying score was 592.
Olympics-bound Swapnil Kushale finished a disappointing 40th with a score of 586 while Chain Singh finished 62nd with 581. In the RPO section, Akhil Sheoran & Niraj Kumar finished 13th & 14th respectively with an identical score of 590.
Written By Nithish
