By Harpal Singh Bedi
Though India failed to win a medal on the last day of the competition it still finished on top of the medal standings at the ISSF World Cup Rifle/Pistol in Beijing on Sunday.
This is the second consecutive World Cup stage, the third time in two years that India has achieved this feat.
India topped the charts with a haul of three gold and one silver medal as hosts China followed with two gold two silver and one bronze for a total medal haul of five. In the last edition in New Delhi, India had jointly topped the standings along with Hungary.
For India while Anjum Moudgil and young Divyansh Panwar started the medal hunt with a gold in the 10m Air Rifle Mixed Team competition, the teenaged pair of Manu Bhaker and Saurabh Chaudhary backed them up with a gold in the 10m Air Pistol Mixed Team Pistol event. Divyansh then won India’s first individual medal by winning silver in the Men’s 10m Air Rifle and then on Saturday, Abhishek Verma in Men’s 10m Air Pistol won India their third gold of the world cup.
In the first final on Sunday in the women’s 25m pistol event none of the three Indians in the fray qualified . Manu Bhaker’s hopes were dashed when she shot 586 in qualifying to finish in 17thposition. Asian Games champion Rahi Sarnobat managed 579 for a 26th place finish while Chinki Yadav, shot 570 to end in 56th position.
Two-time former Olympic champion Maria Grozdeva of Bulgaria shot 36 in the final to beat world number one Anna Korakaki of Greece and Veronika Major of Hungary, who was fresh from a double gold in the New Delhi world cup. The Hungarian settled for silver while Anna was pushed to bronze medal position. Maria along with Monika Karsch of Germany who finished fourth, bagged the two Tokyo 2020 quota places up for grabs in the event.
In the women’s 3P,event ,three Indians in the fray fared poorly. N. Gaayathri finished 19thwith a score of 1169 in qualification while Sunidhi Chauhan shot 1160 to end in 42nd spot. Kajal Saini, was placed 60thwith a qualification round score of 1142.
Beijing Olympic bronze medalist and winner of 17 world cup medals including eight golds, Snjezana Pejcic of Croatia triumphed with a final round score of 464. Bae Sang Hee of Korea won silver with 459.5 while Jeanette Hegg Duestad of Norway won bronze with 447.1. The Korean and the Norweigian also walked away with the two quota places.