'It's hard to describe how happy I am', says Bindra

Beijing, Aug 11 : Olympic gold medal winner Abhinav Bindra today said that it's hard to describe how happy he was after his achievement.

Speaking at a press conference here, Bindra said, "I just went for it. I knew I was lying in fourth. Thankfully, it went my way and I just went for it."

"I was not thinking about making history in India with a first individual gold medal. I was just trying to concentrate on shooting. I was just trying to shoot good shots. I wanted to shoot well and shoot aggressively. And that's what I did," he added.

Bindra won the gold medal in men''s 10-meter air rifle event after earning a total of 700.5 points.

Earlier, Abhinav, who became the first Indian individual gold medallist at the Olympics, had qualified for the men''s 10m air rifle event finals. He finished the qualifying event joint fourth with Romania''s George Alin Moldoveanu after the duo shot a score of 596/600.

He scored a series of 100,99,100,98,100 and 99 in the qualifiers.

However, India''s other medal hope Gagan Narang failed to make the final cut in the same event finishing ninth with a score of 595/600. He shot a series of 97, 100, 100, 100, 98 and 100.

Abhinav, who was the youngest Indian participant at the 2000 Olympic Games, won six gold medals at various international meets in 2001. In the Air rifle event at the 2002 Commonwealth Games, Manchester, he won gold in the Pairs event and silver in the individual event. At the 2004 Olympic Games, he broke the Olympic record but failed to win a medal.

He is a recipient of the Arjuna award in 2001 and the Rajiv Gandhi Khel Ratna award for the year 2001-2002.

ANI