ISSF World Cup, Buenos Aires 2025: Rudrankksh wins gold medal in 10m air rifle final, Babuta finishes seventh
Former world champion Rudrankksh Balasaheb Patil added yet another gold medal to his ever-overflowing trophy cabinet on Sunday while Arjun Babuta finished seventh in the men’s 10m air rifle event at the ongoing ISSF World Cup in Buenos Aires, Argentina.
Rudrankksh was quick off the blocks in the final of the season-opening ISSF tournament, scoring 53.2 and leading after the first series. He remained ahead of the pack throughout the final, with Istvan Peni, the eventual silver medallist, only once threatening to overtake him after the first elimination series.
Babuta, meanwhile, struggled to get going, managing to score only 50.4 off the first five shots. He almost became the first shooter to exit the contest, but a 10.5 saw him edge Peter Matthew Fiori by a mere 0.1 points. However, he couldn’t survive the next elimination series.
China’s Wang Honghao kept surviving multiple elimination series by the skin of his teeth, until he finished just outside the podium places, losing the bronze medal to home favourite M. J. Gutierrez.
Earlier, Babuta and Rudrankksh made the final by virtue of a one-two finish in the qualification round. The Paris 2024 Olympian topped the charts with a score of 634.5, while Rudrankksh scored 633.7.
Kiran Ankush Jadhav finished inside the top eight (sixth) but couldn’t make the final because he was playing for RPO (Ranking Points Only). Divyansh Singh Panwar (628.0, RPO) and Hriday Hazarika (624.6) were the other Indians in action.