India had a successful start to the 12th Asian Airgun Championship in Taipei as India’s young guns clinched gold in both 10m Air Pistol junior and senior events. Exactly a month after a gold medal winning feat at the ISSF World Cup in New Delhi, Manu Bhaker and Saurabh Chaudhary continued their irresistible form with the senior gold while national champion Esha Singh and Vijayveer Sidhu won the gold in juniors.
Bhaker and Saurabh shot a combined 784 in the qualification round, breaking the record set by Russia’s Vitalina Batsarashkina and Artem Chernousov at the European Championships five days back. They later won the five-team finals with a score of 484.8 edging past the Korean team of Hwang Seongeun and Kim Mose of Korea by 3.7 points. Wu Chia Ying and Kou Kuan-Ting from the host nation won bronze with a score of 413.3. The second Indian team of Anuradha and Abhishek Verma shot 764 with the latter accounting for 391, but placed fourth in the final.
Esha and Vijayveer topped qualification in the junior event with 769 and then put together a score of 478.5 in the final to go atop the podium, ahead of the pairs from Korea and Chinese Taipei. The second Indian team of Harshada Nithave and Arjun Singh Cheema placed fourth.
