Anisa Sayyed held on to her status as one of the premier pistol shooters in the country winning the women’s 25m air pistol gold in the 61st National shootingchampionships at the National Games shooting range here on Tuesday.

The Haryana shooter, who was third with a score of 576 in qualification, behind Heena Sidhu (581) and Rani Sarnobat (578), was in great form shooting a consistent 33 in the final to erase the National record of 28 set by Annu Raj Singh in Brisbane earlier this year.

Shital Shivaji Thorat (Maharashtra) came second with 30 points pushing Rani (28) to third.

Maharashtra emerged first in the team event with a total of 1714 points ahead of ONGC (1707) and Haryana (1700).

In the junior women’s section, Chinki Yadav (Madhya Pradesh) took the top spot with a National record bettering performance of 31, a good seven points clear of the old record, leaving Gauri Sheoran (Haryana, 28) and Saee Ashok Godbole (Maharashtra, 20) in second and third places.

Haryana took the gold in the junior women’s team event with 1686 points ahead of Tamil Nadu (1652) and Maharashtra (1641).

On Monday, Swapnil Suresh Kusale (Railway) overhauled the existing National record as he collared the gold medal in the men’s 50m rifle 3-position.The Railway shooter, who had finished fourth in qualification, was a good four points clear of second-placed Satyendra Singh (Army) at the end of the final, totalling 457.0 as against 452.8 returned by the Army gunman as he obliterated the existing record of 456.1, established by Sanjeev Rajput in 2013.

Olympian Chain Singh, who has had a disappointing tournament, was forced to settle for the bronze with 439.8 ahead of Anil Sheoran (Uttar Pradesh), the leader of the qualifying field with a total of 1166.0 over the three positions. Chain Singh was second at that stage with 1164.0, while Surendra Singh Rathod and Swapnil had an identical card of 1163.0.

In the team event, the Army Marksmanship Unit was head and shoulders above the rest, finishing on top with 3472.0 points. Indian Air Force was second with 3458.0 and Indian Navy third at 3443.0.

In the junior category, Nishant Dalal (Haryana) was bang on target as he took gold with a new National record to boot. The Haryanvi shooter, who was hardly challenged in the final, finished with 446.7 erasing the existing mark of 442.1, set by Subhankar Pramanick in Pune last year.

Fateh Singh Dhillon (Punjab) took silver with 443.1 after Harshit Banjwa (Madhya Pradesh) was forced to settle for the third spot with 432.2.

In the 25m centre fire pistol, Anish Bhanwala (Haryana) and Yogesh Singh (Indian Navy) had an identical tally of 582.0 over three rounds each of rapid and precision, but in the countback luck was to favour the Haryana youngster, who last week had won the 25m rapid fire pistol. Anhand Jawanda (Punjab) followed the leaders in third position, two points behind.

Haryana also took the top of the podium in the team event with a total of 1734.0 and was followed by Indian Navy (1725.0) and Punjab (1719.0) in that order.

source: http://www.thehindu.com / The Hindu / Home> Sport> Other Sports / by A. Vinod / Thiruvananthapuram – December 26th, 2017