Harpal Singh Bedi
16-year old Hriday Hazarika did country proud as he shot to glory to become junior world champion in the 10m Air Rifle, while India collected four more medals, including two gold in the 52 ISSF World Championship in Changwon, Korea on Friday.
In the Junior 10m Air Rifle, Hriday was the only Indian among three to qualify for the eight-man final, shooting a solid 627.4 in qualification to make it in sixth spot.
In the 24-shot final, he started with a brilliant 10.8, but a couple of hits in the 9-ring placed him fourth after the first two five shot series.
As the individual shots began, the Indian strung together a fantastic series of high 10s and by the end of the 20th shot, was leading the field by 0.5.
He held on to the lead till the 22ndshot from Iranian Amir Mohammad Nekounam. Then a 9.4 for his 23rdshot meant that at the end of the allotted 24-shots both Hriday and Amir found themselves tied at 250.1 points each.
The final went to a shoot-off and Hriday prevailed with a 10.3 to the Iranian’s 10.2. Russia’s Grigorii Shamakov won the Bronze with 228.6.
India’s second Gold in the day came from the 10m Air Rifle Women Junior team competition where the trio of Elavenil Valarivan, Shreya Agrawal and Manini Kaushik combined to shoot a junior world record score of 1880.7..
Elavenil also won the individual Silver in the event, going down narrowly to China’s double senior World Cup Gold medalist Shi Mengyao, in the final.
Elavenil shot 249.8 to Shi’s 250.5. 17-year old Shreya Agrawal won the Bronze with an effort of 228.4 in the final.
The Indian duo had earlier topped the 60-shot qualification round. Elavenil was top with a score of 631 while Shreya came in second with 628.5.
In the Women’s 25m Pistol, teenager Manu Bhaker was the best placed Indian after the first precision stage of qualification, shooting a very good 294 out of 300 to be among the joint top four scores.
Asian Games champion Rahi Sarnobat was lying 27thwith 289 while Asiad Bronze medalist Heena Sidhu shot 284 to be in 61stposition.
Saturday will see the second Rapid Fire qualification stage preceded by the final.
At the end of day six, India were placed second on the medals table just below hosts Korea who top the standings, So far, India have six Gold, seven silver and five bronze medals.
Other results:
In men’s 50m Rifle 3 Position: Akhil Sheoran fired 1167 and Swapnil Kusale scored 1164 and Sanjeev Rajput scored 1158 in qualification to finish 44th 55th and 58th respectively
The team was placed 11th
In trap mixed team: Manavjit Singh Sandhu and Seema Tomar with a score of 140 came 12th while
Lakshay Sheoran and Shreyasi Singh shot 138 to finish 16th.
In 10m Air Rifle Junior: Divyansh Panwar shot 624.9 , Arjun Babuta fired 620.1 in qualification to finish 11th and 24th respectively.
Team came fourth with a combined score of 1872.3
In 10m Air Rifle women junior, Manini Kaushik shot 621.2 to finish 33rd
India on the day won four medals including two go-gold to take their take their total tally to 18, including six Gold
This is thrice the tally of six medals won at the 49thedition in Zagreb, Croatia- previously India’s best ever performance at the sport’s premiere world event