Medal rush continues, shooters clinch three golds, one silver

Melbourne, Mar 20: Indian guns continued to boom as shooters from the country dominated the ranges here bagging three golds and a silver in the Commonwealth Games today.

India figured in four of the five events this morning and won in all except in the men's skeet pairs.

In the process, Samresh Jung became the only shooter in this competition to have won three golds and a silver so far.

Spearheaded by the young Tejaswini Sawant, and pairs of Samresh Jung and Jaspal Rana and Gagan Narang and Abihnav Bindra, the Indians stamped their authority in no uncertain terms. Adding to the medal rush was another promising shooter Avneet Kaur Sidhu who clinched a silver.

As the strains of Indian National anthem reverberated the ranges the Indian shooters celebrated a golden morning.

It began with Tejaswini piping compatriot Avneet to win gold in the women's 10m Air Rifle. Tejaswini totalled 500.6 to emerge leader while Avneet finished second at 500.2.

Interestingly, Tejaswini and Avneet had paired together on the opening day of the competition to win the gold in the 10m Air Rifles pairs.

Meanwhile, Gagan Narang and Abhinav Bindra in the men's 50m rifle three position pairs won their second gold of the competition without much ado. Narang and Bindra had won 10m Air Pistol pairs title on the opening day.

Samresh Jung and Jaspal Rana shot down 25m Centre Fire Pistol pairs gold as India's medal tally in shooting competition went up to nine golds and four silvers so far.

Tejaswini and Avneet equalled the Games record while qualifying for the finals of the event and eight shooters in the field of 28 made the cut.

In the preliminaries both the Indians totalled 398. Tejaswini's series was 100, 98, 100, 100 while Sidhu shot 99, 100, 99, 100.

Venessa Yong of Singapore who took the bronze had a total of 397 in the preliminaries.

In the final Tejaswini gave a very impressive display shooting 9.8, 9.6, 10.2, 10.4, 10.4, 10.7, 10.5, 10.2, 10.8 and 10.0 to total 102.6 to take her tally to 500.6 Avneet's series in the final was 10.4, 9.4, 9.8, 10.5, 10.2, 10.4, 10.8, 10.2, 10.4, 10.13 and that totalled 102.2 for a combine aggregate of 500.2.

Venessa Yong had a total of 102.9 in the final but her preliminary round aggregate of 397 cost her the gold and she slipped to the third place with an aggregate of 499.9. The Indians equalled Games record in the preliminaries but missed the overall Games record of 500.8 set by Anjali Bhagwat in Manchester in 2002.

''It is simply great,'' a beaming Tejaswini said after winning her second gold. ''It was very tough, Avneet shot well but I think I did well in the finals,'' she added. Avneet complimented Tejaswini for winning the gold and said, ''She is a very good shooter, she performed well and I am happy that gold was won by India.'' Gagan Narang and Abhinav Bindra lived up to their pre-tournament billing and the young duo won their second gold of the competition.

They shot 2287 to push favourites, Australian pair of Michael Brown and Ben Burge to second place. The Aussie duo scored 2269. The bronze was claimed by English pair Jason Burrage and Chris Hector who totalled 2265.

Bindra had 390 in Prone (99, 99, 95, 97), 368 in Standing (93, 92, 89, 94) and 386 in Kneeling (97, 96, 97, 96) to have an individual tally of 1144.

Gagan fired 394 in Prone (97, 100, 99, 98), had 379 in Standing (97, 93, 91, 98) and 370 in Kneeling (94, 90, 94, 92) to total 1143 and their combined score was 2287 which was 13 points short of the Games record but was enough for them to clinch the gold.

''It is always a great feeling to win a gold in an international competition for the country,'' said Abhinav adding, ''Actually we were looking for the Games record. The win is good it will motivate us to do well in the individual events.'' Gagan echoed Bindra's sentiments saying, ''It would have been good if we had set a Games record. We came very close to it.'' Samresh Jung went up to the podium for the fourth time in as many daysto recieve his third gold after picking up a silver as well.

The Indian seems to have hit the purple patch and today with Jaspal Rana earned a gold in 25 m centre fire pistol. Though their gold medal winning total 1150 was 18 points behind the Games record but they had no regrets.

''We won the gold and the record of 1168 is also set by the Indians in Victoria 1994 so there is no problem,'' Samresh said.

''It makes me really proud when I go up for a medal and then listen to the National Anthem and the fluttering of the tricolour also gives us a high,'' he added.

Samresh totalled 577. In Precision he fired 290 (97, 94, 99) and had 287 in Rapid (97, 96, 94). Rana aggregated 573, 285 in Precision (94, 98, 93) and 288 in Rapid (97, 95, 96).

England's Peter Flippant (579) and Simon Lucas (559) with a total of 1138 claimed the silver while South African duo of Allan Stuart Mcdonald (563) and Daniel Francois Van Tonder (572) earned the bronze with 1135.

In men's Skeet pairs, Indian duo of Amit Sanghi and Baba Prithviraj Singh Bedi finished eighth in the field of 12 pairs.

The Indians shot a total of 175, Sanghi fired 90 (21, 24, 22, 23) while Bedi's score was 85 (20, 20, 24, 21).

George Achilleos (97) and Antonis Nikolaides (93) of Cyprus won the gold with 190, Clive Bramley (91) and Richard Brickell (95) of England claimed silver with 186 and bronze went to Australia's Clive Barton (90) and George Barton (95) with 185 in this event.
Clearly unhappy after forced to settle for the silver in double trap, Rajyavardhan Singh Rathore complimented the Australian rivals. ''Of course it would have been good to win the gold. But these things do happen and you have to live with that. The weather was a bit unpredictable, now sunny, now cloudy and that did affect our performance. But no excuse. The Australians are pretty good shooters and all credit goes to them,'' he said.

Armymen Pemba Tamang and Vijay Kumar, on the other hand, are determined to continue their good show in the individual events as well after winning the 25m Rapid Fire Pistol pairs.

''It was good to win gold for the country and this win gives us a fillip. The gold will boost our morale and we hope to repeat the feat in the individual events as well,'' they said.

UNI