National shooting trials: Rudrankksh Patil beats Olympic finalist Arjun Babuta in men’s 10m air rifle; Sift Kaur Samra shines
World Champion Rudrankksh Patil was in robust form as he shot 254.9 in the final, half a point better than the world record, to beat Olympic finalist Arjun Babuta by 2.3 points in men’s 10m air rifle in the National shooting trials at the Dr. Karni Singh Range, Tughlakabad, on Sunday.
Rudrankksh, who had failed to make the cut for the Paris Olympics, topped qualification with 633.3. Umamahesh Maddineni rose to third place ahead of the World University championship silver medallist Smit Moradiya.
KD Jadhav, Niraj Kumar, Pratham Bhadana, and Olympian Sandeep Singh were the others who made the final.
In the women’s rifle 3-position event, Asian Games gold medallist and world record holder Sift Kaur Samra shot 465.6 in a long-drawn final, that tested the patience of the shooters owing to frequent technical glitches, to beat Himani Poonia by 2.3 points for the top spot.
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Olympian Anjum Moudgil placed third ahead of Manini Kaushik, qualification topper Shriyanka Sadangi (594), Nupur Kumrawat, Lajja Gauswami and Ayushi Podder.
It was a remarkable resurgence by Sift, as she had qualified with the lowest score of 589. Two other shooters, Sakshi Padekar and Ashi Chouksey, missed the final with that score.
In men’s 25-metre rapid fire pistol event, Olympian Anish Bhanwala pipped Bhavesh Shekhawat by one point for first place, while fellow Olympian and qualification topper Vijayveer Sidhu (583) placed third ahead of Gurmeet, Rajat Yadav and Ankur Goel.
Olympian Gurpreet Singh missed the final by one point.
The results:
10m air rifle: Men: 1. Rudrankksh Patil 254.9 (633.3); 2. Arjun Babuta 252.6 (632.4); 3. Umamahesh Maddineni 231.2 (631.0).
25m rapid fire pistol: 1. Anish Bhanwala 35 (581); 2. Bhavesh Shekhawat 34 (577); 3. Vijayveer Sidhu 28 (583).
50m rifle 3-position: Women: 1. Sift Kaur Samra 465.6 (589); 2. Himani Poonia 463.3 (592); 3. Anjum Moudgil 452.3 (592).