Straight From Dr. Karni Singh Stadium - Day 3

Not a bad day again for the Indian Shooters at Dr. Karni Singh Shooting range, as India bagged Two Gold’s and One Silver from four events.
The day for the Indians began with a Gold Medal in the ‘Pairs 25m Rapid Fire Pistol’. Vijay Kumar and Gurpreet Singh brilliantly fired to set a new games record with a score of 1162. The former scored 587 in total while Gurpreet scored 575.Vijay Kumar, in the previous edition of CWG Melbourne 2006 had set a record with Pemba Tamang scoring 1134. 18 points below them were the Malaysian pairs Hasli Izwan Amir Hasan (576) and Hafiz Adzha (568) who bagged the Silver Medal. And the Bronze Medal went to the Australian pairs – Bruce Quick (563) and David Chapman (562).

The only disappointment of the day was the World Champion Tejaswini Sawant who could not even qualify for the Final Round of ‘Single 50m Rifle 3 Position Women’. She finished 9th position with a total score of 568 (Prone: 98 & 97, Standing: 89 & 90, Kneeling 97 & 97). Her pair partner Lajjakumari Gauswami qualified for the final round with a score of 570 (Prone: 98 & 98, Standing: 94 & 93, Kneeling 94 & 93). However she could not match the accuracy of her counterparts in the final round and finished 6th with a final round score of 96.8.

In the end it was Australia’s Alethea Sedgmen who raised to the occasion to bagged one more Gold for Australia. Her final score read 676 (575 in the Qualifying and 101 in the final). The Silver and The Bronze Medal went to the young shooters from Singapore Xiang Wei Jasmine Ser (672.6) and Aqilah Sudhir (671.3) respectively. The duo from Singapore had won Gold in ‘Pairs 50m Rifle 3 Position Women’ on Tuesday.

In ‘Singles Double Trap Men’ Ronjan Sodhi kept the Indian flag flying by winning the Silver Medal while the Junior World Champion Asher Noria was little unlucky to finished 4th. 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.

The last event of the day (Pairs 10 M Air Pistol Men) took place in the packed 10 meter range where Omkar Singh and Gurpreet Singh bagged India another shooting Gold. They went on to break Samaresh Jung and Vivek Singh’s record of 1154 in Melbourne Games by 9 points scoring 1163. Omkar Singh the more lethal of the two shot 10 points with near consistency. 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.

With 5 shooting events to be held tomorrow in Dr. Karni Singh Shooting Range and with the likes of Gagan Narang, Omkar Singh and Gurpreet Singh who has already won medals playing again tomorrow, the Indian shooting contingent is certainly looking forward to bagged as many as medals.