Indian shooters reign supreme

Gagan Narang added a third gold to his tally, while Samaresh Jung clinched his second as Indian shooters continued to reign supreme shattering three meet records at the Karni Singh range on the fifth day of the Commonwealth Championships here on Monday.

India’s overall medal tally stood at 26 (13 gold, eight silver and five bronze), way ahead of second-placed England, which has won 15 medals so far — three gold, seven silver and five bronze. Australia occupied the third spot with 10 medals.

Jung was bang on in the individual event as well and after equalling the meet record for the qualifying score, he went on to beat the championship record for the final score.

Jung shot an overall 685.3 (583+102.3) to shatter the meet record of 681.5 held by England’s Michael Gault since 1999. The silver medal in this event went to another Indian Zakir Khan who shot 676.6 (576+100.6).

Gault settled for bronze after shooting a score of 675.1 (574+101.1).

In the rather farcical finals of the 25m rapid fire pistol, Indians swept the medals on offer as the lone foreigner in fray, Gibraltar’s Jonathon Patron, pulled out.

Vijay Kumar bettered the five year old meet record of 760.6 to notch up the gold with a score of 775 (581+194).

Previous record holder Pemba Tamang settled for bronze this time with 756.5 (574+182.5). The silver in this event went to Gurpreet Singh who shot a score of 774.1 (581+193.1).

Gagan, who fetched gold in the 10m air rifle individual and team competition, had a mixed day as he clinched the gold in the 50m rifle 3 position pairs event but missed out on a medal in the individual category.

Narang and Sanjeev Rajput shot a score of (1175+1153) 2323, bettering the meet record set by Rajput and Sushil Ghalay (2279) in 2005, to claim the top honours in the team competition. England’s James Huckle and Ken Parr (Jr) settled for silver with a score of 2295 (1158+1137), while Scotland’s Graham Rudd and Neil Stirton bagged the bronze after scoring 2266 (1135+1131) in the same event.

Gagan finished a disappointing fourth in the individual competition, in which Rajput shot a gold with 1170 points.

England’s James Huckle (1158) managed a silver, while another Indian Hasan Imran Khan took home a bronze (1155). Gagan shot a score of 1153 in this event.

In the trap events, Manavjit Singh Sandhu and Birandeep Sodhi (96+95) fetched a silver in the men’s team competition with a total of 191. The gold medal was clinched by Australians Adam Vella and Michael Mcnabb (194), while the bronze went to England’s Aaron Heading and James Sole (182).