Men’s team shoot down 10m pistol silver

Shymkent: Indian shooters’ quest to better their medal tally at the Asian Championships (rifle/pistol/shotgun) began with the men clinching the 10m air pistol team silver, while Faridabad marksman Anmol Jain missed out on an individual medal in the event, finishing sixth on Monday.

The men’s team, comprising Anmol (580), Aditya Malra (579) and Asian Games gold medallist Saurabh Chaudhary (576) aggregated a score of 1,735 to finish behind China, who took the gold by amassing 1,744 points. Iran took the bronze, totalling 1,733 points.

In the individual men’s 10m air pistol section, Anmol, who progressed into the final in seventh place with a qualification score of 580, ended up sixth in the medal round aggregating 155.1 points. Hu Kai of China took the gold with a score of 241.6, while South Korea’s Hong Suhyeon and Iran’s Amir Joharikhou bagged the silver and bronze with scores of 239.0 and 216.8 respectively.

Interestingly Amit Sharma, a 20-year-old who started competing internationally at as a junior in 2023, beat the 48-strong field to top the qualification round with a superb score of 588. But since he was competing in the ‘Ranking Points Only’ (RPO) category, he could not make it to the final.

Kapil clinched the individual junior men’s 10m air pistol gold with a score of 243.0. He shot 579 in qualification to enter the medal round placed fourth. Another Indian Gavin Antony, who also entered the final, shot a 220.7 to clinch the bronze medal. Gavin (582), Kapil and Vijay Tomar (562) aggregated 1,723 points to win the team silver behind South Korea, who amassed 1,734.

India has fielded 182 shooters across senior, junior and youth categories, which is the country’s biggest-ever contingent in the

continental meet.