Indian shooters fire blank at Asiad

Doha, Dec 6 (UNI) It was a medalless day for Indian markspersons as they failed to make it to the podium place, both in individual and teams events of the Men's 25m rapid fire pistol and women's 50m rifle 3 position events in the shooting competition at the 15th Asian Games here today.

In 25m rapid fire pistol, Vijay Kumar qualified for the final but ended fourth missing the bronze by a whisker. The Indians also placed fourth in the team event as well.

In the preliminary round, Vijay shot a total of 577 in two stages. In the first stage, he shot a series of 95,98,93 to total 286 and in the second stage he had a score of 98, 98, 95 for 291.

Ahead of him were the Chinese trio of Liu Zhongsheng (597), Zhang Penghui (580) and Liu Guohui (579).

Two other Indians, Pemba Tamang and Rahul Panwar, were in the fray and they too cut sorry figure.

Tamang, who totalled 574 to be at 9th place, scored 288 (98,98,92) and 286 (99,96,91) in the two stages.

Pawar scored 563 to finish at 20th place. He shot 286 (100,92,94) and 277 (96,97,84) in his two stages.

In the final, Vijay Kumar shot 198.3 . His first stage score read 8.6, 10.4, 9.8, 10.7, 10.6, 9.7, 9.4, 9.6, 10.7, 8.8 and in second stage, he shot 10.4, 10.4, 10.6, 9.9, 10.2, 9.5, 9.2, 9.3, 10.4, 10.1 .

Vijay's overall total of 775.3 (198.3+577) was not enough and the Indian missed the Bronze as Liu Guohi shot 197.5 but his preliminary round score of 579 turned the tables in his favour as he totalled 776.5.

Liu Zhongsheng 778.4 (199.4+579) won the Gold, followed by Zhang Penghui 778.1 (198.1+580).

The team Gold went to China with a total of 1738. Japan took the Silver (1721), Kazakhstan earned the Bronze (1720) while India, with 1714, were placed fourth.

In the women section, the Indians flopped in 50m Rifle 3 positions, with Tejaswini Sawant ending seventh while her team mates, Deepali Deshpande and Anjali Bhagwat were placed well down the leader board at 19th and 22nd places, respectively.

The individual and team Gold in the event was won by China.

Tejaswini, however, did well to qualify for the finals while Deepali and Anjali fell by the wayside in the preliminary rounds.

Tejaswani had a total of 578 in the preliminary round and on the strength of this score, she made it to the last round as first eight qualify for the medal contest.

The Indian shooter had a superb prone round in which he shot 100,99 (199) while in standing her score was 95,91 (186) and in kneeling she shot 95,98 (193).

In the final, she shot 94.9 with a series of 7.9, 10.5, 9.0, 10.1, 9.9, 9.0, 9.5, 9.0, 9.9, 10.1 to take her aggregate to 672.9 (94.9+578).

Deepali totalled 570- 197(99,98) in prone, 187 (95,92,) in standing and 186 (94,92) in kneeling.

Anjali Bhagwat, who had a disappointing competition here so far, totalled a below par 569 --- 196 (98,98) in prone, 187 (95,92) in standing and 186 (95,91) in kneeling for the 22nd place.

The Gold went to China's Wang Chengyi who totalled 685.4 (100.4+585), while Kazakh Olga Dovgun won Silver with 682.3 (96.3+586) and South Korean Na Yoon Kyung took the Bronze with 680.2 (99.2+581).

The team Gold was clinched by China with 1744 points. Bahrain was the surprised Silver medal winner with 1631 while host Qatar took the Bronze with 1608.

UNI HSB AY RS1826