Karan Sehrawat of Haryana and Divya TS of Karnataka emerged victorious at the men’s and women’s 10m air pistol trials (T2) on Sunday, concluding the new season’s first two national selection trials for rifle and pistol.
The international season begins early in 2024, when the Indian rifle and pistol squad heads to Jakarta, Indonesia, to take part in the Asian Olympic qualifying event for which the teams have been already announced.
Olympian Saurabh Chaudhary extended his good run to a second day, topping the men’s 10m air pistol T2 qualifications with a world-class score of 586. He was followed by his senior Olympian Gurpreet Singh who shot the same score but had seven lesser inner 10s than Saurabh.
Three Haryana shooters took the final three qualifying spots, with Aditya Marla and Sehrawat finishing sixth and seventh, while eventual runner-up Shiva Narwal claimed the eighth and final spot with a 583.
They turned the tables in the final, however, denying Saurabh a repeat of his T1 win on Saturday.
Sehrawat played the perfect final as he led throughout the 24-shot decider with his opponent giving a scare only after the 20th shot, getting within just 0.1. That was the closest he would get as Karan took the title with a final score of 243.0 to Shiva’s 242.6.
Kedarling Uchaganve of the Army beat Saurabh to third, finishing with 222.4.
In the women’s 10m air pistol T2 final, India international Divya denied runner-up Manu Bhaker and third-placed Anuradha Devi in yet another Haryana 1-2 with a virtuoso performance.
Her 243.8, was well ahead of Manu’s 242.4.
Rhythm Sangwan topped with 578 in the 60-shot qualification round which did not reach searing scoring heights. Anuradha was second with 577 while the seasoned Annu Raj Singh was third with 576.
Manu finished fifth on the same score as Anuradha, while Divya just sneaked in on countback in eighth after being tied with two others on 574.
She was joint fifth after the first five singles shots series and only moved up to third after the second set of fives with Anuradha and Manu on track for a Haryana 1-2.
After the 14th single shot, Divya was ahead of Anuradha and was just 0.3 behind Manu, who was in the lead. A couple of solid 10s more and she was in the lead for the first time in the final after the 16th.
Manu then faltered with an 8.8, enabling Divya to go ahead by two after the 18th and she closed out the contest confidently.
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