Shooting Worlds: Bittersweet day for Swapnil Kusale
Vinayak Padmadeo
New Delhi, October 22
Shooter Swapnil Kusale is very reserved and quiet, and that explains his short and curt responses. The 27-year-old, however, broke character on Saturday while trying to explain a horror score at the ISSF World Championships in Cairo. Due to one poor shot, he dropped down from a potential fight for gold to the fourth place in the 50-metre 3 Positions rifle competition.
I am sad that it cost me the medal, but I’m a little satisfied that we won a quota, which was what we wanted before we reached here. It is part of the learning process. These things happen in sports. You win some, you lose some. Swapnil Kusale
It could have been the biggest medal of his career, but the Kolhapur boy shot a below-par 8.2 with a poor shot and a medal eluded him. The consolation is that the fourth place won a third quota spot for India at the 2024 Paris Olympics.
For Kusale, it was a bittersweet day. “I do not have the words to explain my feelings right now,” Kusale told The Tribune from Cairo. “It has happened. It is over. Now, going forward, I will take this experience to improve my shooting.”
After a bit of probing, he opens up about what went wrong with that shot. “I have been thinking about it. What I have analysed is that I took a lot of time to release that shot, and that maybe played a role in the low score,” Kusale said.
“Yes, I am sad that it cost me the medal, but I’m a little satisfied that we won a quota, which was what we wanted before we reached here,” he added.
He said he was satisfied with his overall performance as he scored 593 to qualify second for the ranking match.
Kusale, who ended the kneeling round in a lead of 1.1 point, wobbled in the prone position with a shot of 9.8, sliding to fourth. He recovered to stay in the bronze medal position at the end of the prone round.
He secured the Paris quota after 35-shots. Just when a medal seemed a real possibility, an 8.2 pulled him down from the second position.
“It is part of the learning process. These things happen in sports. You win some, you lose some,” he said.
Serhiy Kulish of Ukraine, Poland’s Tomasz Bartnik and Norway’s Jon-Hermann Hegg took the top three positions on the podium.
Rhythm misses out
There was more heartbreak for India as Rhythm Sangwan came within a whisker of winning a Paris quota in the women’s 25m pistol competition.
Rhythm, who topped the precision round with 295, shot 292 in the rapidfire round to qualify third for the ranking round with a total of 587.
Manu Bhaker finished 10th with 583 points while Abhidnya Ashok Patil shot 580 to finish 19th.
In the first ranking round, Rhythm did not record any hits in the fourth series to finish third with 11 hits while Germany’s Doreen Veenekamp and South Korea’s Jangmi Kim made it to the medal match with 14 hits each. In the second ranking match, Bulgaria’s Antoaneta Kostadinova and Yan Chen of China made it to the medal match. Iran’s Haniyeh Rostamiyan finished third with 11 hits. Rostamiyan won the quota on offer here as she had a better qualification score than Rhythm.
