Gagan qualifies for all rifle events in Beijing Olympics

New Delhi, Jun 4 (UNI) Gagan Narang fired a national record equalling 595 in the 50m Rifle Prone event at the World Cup in Milan to achieve the Minimum Qualifying Score (MQS) for a place in all the rifle competitions of the 2008 Beijing Olympics.

Gagan, who has already booked an Olympic quota place after winning the Gold in the 10m Air Rifle event at the World Cup in China, shot a series of 100,98,100,98,99,100 to register his personal best score so far and achieve the MQS for Olympics in this event, according to information recieved have.

Among the other Indians, Commonwealth Games Bronze Medallist Sanjeev Rajput survived the elimination round with a score of 588 (97,97,99,96,99,100) but Surendra Singh Rathod, who shot a score of 583 (98,96,99,97,95,98), and Imran Hasan Khan with a score of 582 (97,97,96,97,97,98) failed to qualify the elimination rounds.

Meanwhile, another Commonwealth Games Gold Medallist Pemba Tamang finished 11th in the 25m Rapid Fire Pistol event after shooting a score of 578 with a stage one score of 291 (98,96,97) and stage two score of 287 (96,96,95).

Compatriots Vijay Kumar and Ramkishan Yadav finished 25th and 6th repectively with scores of 573 (286+287 and 557 (283+274. The Gold in this event was won by three times Olympic Gold medallist Ralf Schumann of Germany, who also improved on his final World Record at the last week's World Cup at Munich and set a new mark at 787.7 (587+200.7).

Roman Bondaruk of Ukraine won the Silver with a score of 780.2 (585+195.2) while the Bronze was won by Zhongshe Liu of China with a score of 779.9 (582+197.9), with Liu also winning the Olympic quota place.

In the women's section, Sonia Rai finished a disappointing 22nd in the 25m Sports Pistol event after shooting a score of 576 with stage one 286 (96,94,96) and stage two 290 (96,98,96). Saroja Kumari stood at the 52nd spot with a score of 565 (278+287), while Shweta Chaudhary shot a score of 552 (282+270) to finish 74th.

The Gold in this event was won by last week's World Cup Munich Bronze Medallist Fengji Fei of China with a score of 793.4 (584+209.4), Silver was won by Ying Chen of China with a score of 789.0 (583 +206.0) while Antoanet Boneva of Bulgaria won the Bronze and the Olympic quota place with a score of 787.3 (585+202.3).

UNI PM LR RN1046