Shooting stars: Saurabh bags gold, Esha takes home silver

Tribune News Service

New Delhi, March 1

The Indian shooting contingent had a memorable day at the ISSF World Cup in Cairo, with Saurabh Chaudhary winning the men’s 10m air pistol gold. His feat was followed by a top-class performance from 17-year-old Esha Singh, who won the silver in the women’s 10m air pistol category.

Chaudhary comfortably beat Germany’s Michael Schwald 16-6 in the final to bag the gold. Tokyo Olympics silver medallist Artem Chernousov won the bronze.

This was Chaudhary’s third individual World Cup gold and the first in the new format in the year’s first main shooting event.

Esha, however, lost 4-16 in the final against Greece’s Anna Korakaki to win her first-ever senior ISSF medal.

The back-to-back podium finishes would come as a relief for the Indian team which had a forgettable Tokyo Games campaign, where they finished without a medal, despite being the No. 1 team as per the rankings.

The 19-year-old Chaudhary, who came the closest to a podium finish at the Olympics by entering the final, was third after the 60-shot qualification today, having aggregated 584 points to qualify for the first semifinal. Chernousov topped the qualification round with a near-perfect score of 591 points.

As per the new final format, shooters get eliminated after 10 shots and the second batch after 15. Chaudhary advanced to the medal round, along with Chernousov, as both tallied 38 points. The shooter who registers the highest single-shot score is awarded four points, while others get three, two and one each, respectively.

Schwald and Azerbaijan’s Ruslan Lunev were the other two competitors to make it to the medal round from the second semifinal.

In the women’s category, Esha, who had won an individual silver at the ISSF Junior World Championships in Lima last year, was third after the qualification round with a total of 578 points. Only Korakaki with 583 points and Bulgaria’s Antoaneta Kostadinova, who won the bronze, finished higher than Esha with 584 points.

The youngster was leading Korakaki till the first eight shots in the final but surrendered the lead on the ninth shot. After the eliminations, the Greek proved too good in the gold medal match and won 16-4.

In the final, the winner of a single shot is awarded two points and the first to 16 points wins.

Chaudhary was comfortably placed and required only 11 single shots — including scores of 10.5, 10.8 and 10.6 in the last three of his final four shots — to seal the gold.

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